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A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



With the year 
Seasons return, but not lo me returns 
Day, or the sweet approach of ev'n or mom, 
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose, 
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine. 

MiLTOlI. 



By MES. s/H.>DeKROYFT. 



NEW YORK: 

JOHN F. TROW, PRINTER AND STEREOTYPER, 

377 & 379 BROADWAY. 

1859. 



^5 f6 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, 

By S. H. DeKEOYFT, 

In the Clerk's Ofllce of the District Court foi the Southern District of 
New York. 



TO 



MRS. DOCTOR NOl I, 



or TTXION COLLEGE, 6CHENKCTADY, 



H'HO FIRST SUGGESTED ITS PUBLK AIIC» 



THIS VOLUME 



IS VERY AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED 



^^ tit ^itfjoiew* 



N 



PREFACE. 



These Letters are simply copies of my own 
thoughts and feehngs, written with no expec- 
tation of their ever being read by others than 
the persons to whom they were addressed. 
But as the author of the "Memoirs of my 
Youth" laid bare his "palpitating heart" to the 
world for the sake of dollars, so I have been 
induced to gather from my friends these frag- 
ments, and bind them into a book. 

Three summers ago, I had perfect sight. I 
was in one short month a bride, a widow, and 
blind ; yet Providence has made it needful for 



6 PREFACE. 

me to do something to provide for myseli 
food and raiment. 

Upon the loss of my sight. I was, through 
the influence of Senator Backus, of Rochester, 
allowed to spend one year at the New -York 
Institution for the Blind, which time expired 
last May; and I had not where to go, or a 
friend whose kindness my three years of de- 
pendence had not wearied. There was no 
alternative, and with many fears of success, I 
embarked in the little enterprise of publishing 
this volume, by soliciting subscribers who 
would give their names, and pay me in ad- 
vance. 

Accordingly, with my prospectus in my 
hand, I first waited upon the Board of Man- 
agers of the Institution, who lent me their 
influence, and sanctioned my eflbrts by sub- 
scribing for several copies each. Th3 next 
day, I waited upon the gentlemen of the City 



PREFACE. 7 

Hall, and encouraged by their kindness, thence 
passed on through Broadway, Wall, South, 
and most of the principal streets of the city ; 
and now that my task is ended, and my little 
book .'s about going to the publishers, I have 
not an unpleasant memory associated with the 
whole affair. In the hurry of business, in the 
intricacies of law, and amidst problems half 
solved, gentlemen have laid down their pens, 
read my prospectus, written their names, and 
paid their money; and often escorted me to 
the door, and saw me safely down the stairs, 
perchance, directing my gentle guide where to 
find others as kind as themselves. 

Gratitude is the purest cf the heart's me- 
mories, and I can only offer to my friends, 
subscribers, purchasers, and all, my warmest 
thanks. I cannot compliment my own work ; 
I shall leave it with an indulgent public. In 
perusing its pages, however^ the reader must 



8 PREFACE. 

remember that they were either written with 
the sense of feehng, by means of a grooved 
card, and pencil, or prompted to a friend, from 
an overburdened heart. 

S. HELEN DeKROYFT, 

New-York Institution for the Blind, 
Seotember 26, 1849. 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



Rochester, April, 1848. 
My precious Mother, — My whole heart 
IS drawn out to you. When WilUam was 
with me, I loved him more than all the world 
oeside, but he is in the grave now, and my 
purest affections, mother, evermore are yours. 
If this frail body could move with the fleetness 
of thought, I would come to you now, and 
pillow my weary head on your bosom, and 
your soft hands would dry these tears from 
my poor eyes. Oh that I could opon them 
once more, mother, and see your smiling face, 
and feel my spirit grow warm and gentle in 
the light of your eyes, and your looks of love. 
Tell me, dear mother, have you changed at 
all ? Do you look as when I saw you last 7 
1* 



10 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Oh, had I known that ere we should meet 
again, the light would leave me, how would 1 
have gazed on your form, until on my spirit 
were engraved your every look and feature ! 
You often come to me now, when dreams pos- 
sess my thoughts, and then I tell you how sad 
it is to be blind, and how melancholy the long 
days and nights are, and how I sometimes 
almost pray to go into the spirit world, and 
mount the wings of light for ever. But mother, 
I bless God for a cheerful faith, and a heart 
all resigned. Whatever his hand orders is for 
the best. .You taught me early to kiiow^ and 
try to cZo, the will of God ; but, mother, to suffer 
it is another thing. I could climb the Rocky 
Mountains to teach the Indians, cross the seas, 
and live for ever with the Hindoos, and the 
task would seem light, and my burdens easily 
borne; but when I look along the current, of 
perhaps fifty years, of darkness, dear mother^ 
my heart fails, and like the doubting Hebrew, 
I begin to sink. Then an unseen arm lifts 
me, and whispers, " Be still, and know that 
I am God." Yes, dear mother, what we do 
QOt know now, we shall know hereafter. In 



A CHEERFUL FAITH. U 

a few days, new hills and valleys will inter- 
vene, and your anxious cares for your child 
will be kindled anew. But be comforted ; the 
widow's God will take care of me, the friend 
of the ravens will not leave nor forsake me, 
and ere long, I shall come to you again. My 
heart soaxes me to come to you noAV, but duty 
points another way. Things are not always 
what they seem. When Moses looked around, 
for the last time, upon the white tents pitched 
at the foot of the mountain, and pressed the 
hands of the sires who had grown gray in his 
friendship, and embraced the little ones whose 
hearts had budded into life in the light of his 
heavenly face ; when he bade adieu to all that 
was dear, and began his journey up the weary 
side of Pisgah, he little knew that the clouds 
which overhung him would so soon break 
away, and the glories of the promised land 
burst upon his enraptured vision. Mother, so 
good may yet come to me ; there may be in 
reserve a morning whose dawn is not yet be- 
gun. Faith is the blossom t)f the soul; it makes 
the doctrine of a future life a bright reality^ 
keeps heaven near, and brings departed ones in 



12 A PLACE IN THY MEMORr. 

speaking distance; it chases away the shades 
of grief, and puts fear to flight. 

Dear mother, your parting words are still 
fresh in my memory, and your prayers and 
tears are locked in my heart. Your love is a 
sort of spirit robe that covers all my thoughts, 
and I wear it every where. Kiss little sisters 
and brother often for me, and let them never 
forget their sister Helen; but they must not 
think of me only as something sad and melan- 
choly, for I am growing more cheerful now; 
sometimes I laugh almost as merrily as ever. 
Tell brother, when I come again he will gather 
wild flowers with me as before, and I can hear 
him say his lessons, and Nin and Mary will 
read for me, and write all my letters, and I 
will teach them some new songs, and tell them 
many stories. They must go to the library 
every week, and write me what they read. 



SOUTHERN CHARACTER. 13 



Water-Cure^ Long Island. 
My good Friend Mr. Dean : — Let me 
thank you many times for your dear note of 
yesterday. How kind of you to think of me 
in your leisure moments, when they come to 
you so seldom ! I have no new thing to write 
to you, save that to-morrow Dr. and Mrs. 
Nott leave for their home in Schenectady, and 
also a lovely family, Mr. and Mrs. Hardy and 
daughter, of Virginia, all of whom will be very 

much missed in our circle. Mrs. H is 

somewhat larger than myself; her complexion 
is a dark brunette ; she has jet black eyes, and 
her raven tresses nearly touch the ground. 
Some say she is a descendant of Pocahontas 
or Metoka as her father called her. I do love 
a real Southern character, it makes cue so cor- 
dialj generous, and impulsive. Mrs. Hardy 
and myself have climbed these hills together, 
crossed valleys, and traversed winding foot- 
paths, and waded the brooks, and plunged and 
bathed together, till she seems almost a part 
if myself I shall miss her gentle hand and 



14 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



kind words every where. But they have 
arranged that 1 pass the month of May next 

at their pleasant home in N , which I fancy 

will be a little romid of delight, almost a dissi- 
pation. The winter looks dark and cheerless 
now, for as yet I know not where to pass it ; 
but you see there is a bright spot for me in the 
spring-time ; so I will go on, laughingly and 
gladly, as though I had a fortune secured, and 
nothing more to do in this life but live and be 
happy. 

One little thing I must tell you : Mrs. Hardy 
promises \\^hen she gets to New- York to send 
me back a nice writing-desk for a keepsake. 
Will not that be a precious gift ? and how 1 
shall love the dear thing for her sake ! Oh, 
why is every body so kind to me ? I cannot be 
sad long at a time if I try ; some tuneful voice 
always comes to cheer, and some gentle hand 
to guide and bless me. 

Dr. S is anxious for me to remain here 

until 1 am quite well. He says the water 
treatment is much more effectual in cold 
weather than in warm. Besides, the good 
Quaker stev/ard and stewardess often say, " I 



THE HUSHED HOUR. lb 

think we must keep thee here this winter, 
thou wilt be so much company for us." 



JVew-Yorh Institution for the Blind. 
My precious Mother, 

The sun set upon the sea, and the moon 
rose above the liills, and the stars came out 
smiUng through the clouds, like bands of 
angels, with linked hands, flying through the 
heavens. The reading hour past, we sang an 
evening hymn, and prayers were said, and the 
bell rang for ten, and all laid them down to 
sleep. To Him who sits enthroned in the 
abodes of Hght and iove, I heard Mary's lips 
whispering of mother, home, and heaven. 
Perchance she is dreaming now of faces 
imaged on her heart long ago, and the sunny 
hours of childhood with their visions of joy 
have come to possess her thoughts. It is mid- 
night, that deep hushed hour, when the soul 
turns ba3k upon itself, and all the thoughts 
and feelings are chased homeward by incidents 
of the past. Now the night dews are hanging 
lightly on all the flowers, and the green leaves 



16 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

in moony shadows are trembling on the walls, 
and the lengthened forms of the waving boughs 
are crawling on the floor, as the shades of 
melancholy creep o'er my soul. Away yonder 
on the bosom of the Hudson the lights of the 
sky are twinkling ; so up in heaven, on the 
fountain that wells from the throne, the smiles 
of God are playing. The world of spirits is 
opened to ours, and ours to theirs ; even now, 
loved ones departed are in smiling distance, 
and their blent voices fall on my ear, like the 
pulses of a lute, when the waking hand ha-s 
passed away. They come in the night time, 
when silence holds her spell-like reign, and in 
unseen communion spirit doth with spirit 
blend. Night too is the time for prayer ; then 
the ear of Heaven is nearer bent, and the full 
sad heart, by faith, breathes a freer air, and 
leaping upward, gets new and clearer glimpses 
of the Christian's better life. So Jesus, wearied 
with the toils of the day, oft at night climbed 
lonely Olivet, apart to pray and talk with his 
Father in heaven, and seraphs who had grown 
old in his love were with him there ; and while 
he kneeled upon the damp earth, their spirit 



OUR BLUE ONTARIO. 17 

hands dried his tears away. Dear mother, I 
often fancy you must be near, and turn to hear 
you speak, and put out my hand, but to greet 
the empty air. Oh, think of me when the 
morning breaks, and when the noon is bright, 
and the day dechnes ; and pray for me too, 
lest this hfe of darkness make me sad, and 
loneHness' self settle on me. Write to me often, 
mothei, and say I have always a place in 
your love, and a memory in your prayers ; say 
that little brother and sisters speak of me in 
their play, and count the days until I shall 
come back again. I am pleased with the In- 
stitution. If Charity herself had come down to 
build on earth a home for her children, and 
Innocence had gathered them, the dwelling 
were not more fair, or its inhabitants more 
lovely and pure. But, dear mother, I love our 
blue Ontario more ; its green shore inurns the 
stirring memories of a heart that was my own; 
besides, the dearest spot is always where our 
friends abide. When the sun was going down 
I went into the garden, and felt around among 
the bushes, until I found some flowers, and 
gathered a beautiful bouquet for you, mother, 



18 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

and now, in fancy, I will steal softly into yoiii 
room, and lay it on your pillow. May its 
sweet perfumes make you dream ol a la]if3 
where flowers never fade, and those we love 
never die ; where sorrow may not come, and 
where with a napkin of love all tears shall be 
wiped from our eyes. 



Institution for the Blind, January, 1847. 

This hour I sit me down to write you in a 
little world of sweet sounds. The choir in the 
chapel are chanting at the organ their evening 
hymn — across the hall a little group with the 
piano and flute are turning the very, atmo- 
sphere into melody ; but Fanny, the poetess, 
is not there. Many weeks her harp and guitar 
have been unstrung, and we fear the hand of 
consumption is stealing her gentle spirit away. 
In a room below, some twenty little blind girls 
are joining their silvery voices in tones sweet 
and pure as angels' whispers. And ah ! here 
comes one who has strayed from their number 



THE STARRY SKY. 19 

the twentieth time to-day, clambering her little 
arms about my neck for a kiss. Earth has no 
treasure so heavenly as the love of a sinless 
child. Man seldom welcomes you farther than 
die fair vestibule of his heart, but a child in- 
vites you within the temple, where alone the 
incense of unselfish love burns upon its own 
altar. 

'Tis evening — the moonbeams gladden all 
the hills, the stars are out and I see them not — 
once my poor eyes loved to watch those wheel- 
ing orbs, till they seemed joyous spirits bathing 
in the holy light of the clear upper skies : — 
out noio they are not lost to me ; fancy, with a 
soul-lit look, often wanders in the halls of me- 
mory, where hang daguerreotypes of all that is 
bright and beautiful in nature, from the lowest 
flower that unfolds its petals to the sunbeams, 
up to the cloud-capt mountain and the regions 
of the starry sky — whence she plumes her 
pinions, boldly entering upon new and untried 
regions of thought ; passes the boundary of 
the unseen, to far-off fields where " Deity geo- 
metrizes," and nebular worlds are ever spring- 
ing into new life and glory ; and upwards still 



20 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY, 

to the spirit land, where all are blessed and 
lost in present joys, till happiness, forgetful, 
numbers not the hours. There my thoughts 
love to linger, till with the angels I seem to 
come and go, wandering oy joy's welling fomi- 
tains and glad rivers of delight ! 

But oh ! this is truth and not fancy. My 
life is a " night of years," and my path is a 
sepulchred way ; on one side sleeps my 
FRIEND, and on the other lies buried forever a 
world of light, and all its rays revealed : the 
smiles of friends and all their looks of love, 
without which the heart knoAvs no morning. 
The Saviour wept at the grave of his friend, 
and I know he does not chide these tears ; 
they are the impeaiied dews of feeling which 
gather round a sorrowed heart. But where 
God sends one angel to afflict, he always sends 
many more to comfort ; so I have many angel 
friends who love me well. Their gentle hands 
lead me by pleasant ways, and their tuneful 
voices read to me, and the kindness of their 
words makes my heart better. Oh ! tell me ; 
when summer gladdens the world and vaca- 
tion gladdens me, shall I again be on the banks 



SORROW. 21 

of the Genesee, the while loved and blessed by 
the warm hearts of Rochester 7 



'X/%i^\^%^\/X^Si^^/> 



Lake Cottage^ November, 1847. 

My dear Lizzy: — It is not pleasant to be 
blind. My poor eyes long to look abroad upon 
this beautiful world, and my prisoned spirit 
struggles to break its darkness. I would love 
dearly to bonnet and shawl myself and go forth 
to breathe the air alone, and free as the breeze 
that fans my brow. But as Milton once said 
to his favorite daughter, " It matters little whe- 
ther one has a star to guide or an angel-hand 
to lead ;" and, Lizzy, we must learn to bear, 
and blame not that which we cannot change. 
The journey of life is short. We may not 
stop here xong, and sorrow and trial discipline 
tlie spirit, and educate the soul for a future 
life ; and those upon whom we most depend, 
we love most. A good English writer says, 
" Let thy heart be thankful for any circum- 
stance that proves thy friend." 



22 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Two summers have come and gone sinct 
my William died in Rochester. We brought 
him here and laid him down in the grave to 
sleep, close by his childhood-home, where the 
quick winds and white waves of Ontario 
come swelling to the shore ; and nigh above 
its silvery bosom, clouds, dove-like, are hang- 
ing. One moon had hardly waned, when the 
angels came again, and while I slept darkened 
my weeping eyes for ever. Oh ! Lizzy, was 
sorrow ever so deep ? was misery ever so 
severe ? Hope departed, and an unyielding 
blight settled on all the joys my heart had 
wed. " Passing a way " is truly a part of 
earth. It lends a deathlil^e air to our gay en- 
joyments, and mingles sorrow with our cups of 
bliss. It stops for ever our happy labors, and 
frustrates our choicest plans. Those whom 
we learn to love, die, and the cold earth presses 
the lips we have loved to kiss, and freezes the 
hearts tuned to beat in unison witli our own. 
Lizzy, evermore I am blind, and a wanderer, 
but not homeless. I have God for my father, 
the angels for friends, and Jesus an "elder 
Drother." The pure homes in many hearts, 



LAKE JOTTAGE. 23 

too, are mine — dwellings dearer than all the 
world beside. 

This morning finds me at Mr. Ledyard's de- 
lightful " Lake Cottage," where Lombard pop- 
lars lift their tapering tops almost to prop the 
skies ; the willow, locust, and horse-chestnirt, 
spread their branches, and flowers never cease 
to blossom. Maggie is my kind amanuensis. 
Now she reads to me — gives me her arm for a 
walk. Now, with her harp and tuneful voice, 
jhe unchains the soul of song, the while cover- 
-ng all my thoughts with gladness, till 1 almost 
forget my " night of years," and live in a land 
where ever swells with melody the air, and 
sorrow and tears are unknown, save such as 
pitying angels weep. With Maggie all joys 
are less than the one joy of doing kindness. 
Her smile makes the sunshine of many hearts ;' 
the cloudless dawning of their new enjoy- 
ments. 

It is Thanksgiving Day, Lizzy, and my 
Uioughts have been wandering backward, far 
over the current of years. Reflection is indeed 
an angel, when she points out the errors of the 
past and gives us courage to avoid them in the 



24 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

future. Maggie is reading me the book of Job, 
and this evening my spirit more than ever looks 
up in thankfuhiess to God for the Bible, Hea- 
ven's purest gift to mortals. It is the star of 
eternity, whose mild rays come twinkling to 
this nether sphere ; erring man's guide to wif, - 
dom, virtue, and heaven. The Bible is the 
book of books. In comparison Byron loses his 
fire, Milton his soarings. Gray his beauties, and 
Homer his grandeur and figures. No eye like 
rapt Isaiah's ever pierced the veil of the future ; 
no tongue ever reasoned like sainted Job's ; no 
poet ever sung like Israel's shepherd king, and 
God never made a man more wise than Solo- 
mon. The words of the Bible are pictures of 
immortality; dev/s from the tree of Know 
ledge ; pearls from the river of Life, and gems 
of celestial thought. As the moaning shell 
whispers of the sea, so the Bible breathes of 
love in heaven, the home of angels, and joys 
too pure to die. Would I had read it more 
when my poor eyes could see. Would more 
of its pure precepts were bound about my 
heart, and I had wisdom to make them the 
mottoes of my life. The world may entertain 



MARY S TEARS. 25 

Its idea of a magnificent Deity, whose govern- 
ment is general , but let me believe in the 
Lord God ot Elijah, whose providence is en- 
tire, ordering the minutest event in human life, 
and with a father's care arranging it for the 
greatest possible good. Yes, Lizzy, when 
storms gather, and my way is dark and drear, 
with no star to guide, nor voice to cheer, my 
sinking spirit finds refuge in the world-wide 
sympathies of a Saviour who did not chide 
Mary for her tears, and came himself to weep 
at the grave of his friend. 

My dear Lizzy, I fear 1 have written you 
too long and too sad a letter; but, dearest, do 
not think me melancholy ; like all the rest of 
the world I have more smiles than tears, more 
good than ill. Let me thank you many times 
for your kind invitations to be with you on 
New Year's Day at your new home, and foi 
your gentle hint that Santa Claus will be 
there too. Maggie says his majesty will be in 
the country at that time, and I must stop here ; 
however, I shall be with you, Lizzy ; till then 
good-bye, with my unabated love. 

P. S. Water is to nature what melancholy is 
2 



26 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

to the soul; beautiful in its mildness, but ter- 
rific and fearful in its wrath. When I began 
my letter, Ontario was sleeping in her beauty; 
but since then slie has foamed and roared like 
a thing of very madness, and her long circling 
waves have overturned the seaman's home, 
and borne it far down where the dolphins 
sleep, and the bones of wrecked mariners lie 
thick on the ground. 

To-day I took a long adieu of William's 
grave ; Maggie led me there and left me alone 
awhile, to commune with the dead; and as 
the waves washed the bright pebbles to the 
shore and bore them back again, so the tide of 
memory swept over my heart its cherished 
hopes ; and I watched them fall back into the 
sea of life, to return no more. 



June 14, 1841). 
My dear Mrs. Fisher, — Your letter was 
a darling little visitor. My heart has had 
many a sweet chat with its friendly words 



LIGHT AND SHOWERS. 27 

How glad it made me I cannot tell you. It is 
pleasant to be remembered. I regret that Mr. 

F — could not find time to call, but such 

remissness of duty is always pardonable in a 
business man. Well, dear Jenny, " they tell 
me Spring is waking," and all nature is teem- 
ing with very gladness ; the leaves and buds 
and twigs with new life are swelling, the little 
brooks have unclasped their icy bands, and the 
lake waters have broken their magic fetters, 
and the waves again dance to the tunes the 
breezes play, and the little seeds in the warm 
earth, like loving hearts, are beating and strug- 
gling upward to the world of light and show- 
ers ; so may our hearts pant for the waters 
whose streams flow fast by the throne of God, 
and the smile of Him whose look makes the 
light of heaven. 

You are going to your pleasant home ; may 
it be ever the resting place of peace and plen- 
ty, and may no ills come there, and no storms 
gather to mar your happiness. The days J 
passed with you are with me yet, like a dream 
of love which may not be told. True, joy did 
not crowd the hours with gladness, but all that 



28 A PLACE IN THY MEMORV. 

souls can share we straightway embarked in 
a httle commerce of heart, and felt ourselves 
growing richer by a perfect interchange of 
views and feelings. Locke, in all his reason- 
ings, lived not half so fast. The world I live 
in is an ideal world, and its inhabitants are 
beings of fancy, and of course sinless and 
good ; their lips speak no lies, and their hands 
work no evil ; their smiles are like the beams 
of the morning, and their whispers like the 
night breeze among the flowers, soft and heal- 
ing as the breath of prayer. Still, Jenny, this 
morning my imprisoned spirit would go into 
raptures for one glance at this world of light ; 
oh yes, I would bow in grateful adoration for 
the fragment beam that plays idly on an in- 
fant'"? tear, or sports with a drop of dew. Oh 
holy light ! thou art old as the look of God, 
and eternal as his breath. The angels were 
rocked in thy lap, and their infant smiles were 
brigntened by thee. Creation is in thy memory ; 
by thy torch the throne of Jehovah was set, 
and thy hand burnished the myriad stars that 
glitter in his crown. Worlds, new, from His 
omnipotent hand, were sprinkled with beams 



INVOCATION TO LIGHT. 29 

from thy baptismal font. At thy golden urn 
pale Luna comes to fill her silver horn, and 
Saturn l)athes his sky-girt rings ; Jupiter lights 
his waning moons, and Venus dips her queenly 
robes anew. Thy fountains are shoreless ^s 
the ocean of heavenly love, thy centre is every 
where, and thy boundary no power has marked. 
Thy beams gild the illimitable fields of space, 
and gladden the farthest verge of the universe. 
The glories of the seventh heaven are open to 
thy gaze, and thy glare is felt in the woes of 
lowest Erebus. The sealed books of heaven 
by thee are read, and thine eye, like the Infi- 
nite, can pierce the dark veil of the future, and 
glance backward through the mystic cycles of 
the past. Thy touch gives the lily its white- 
ness, the rose its tint, and thy kindling ray 
makes the diamond's light; thy beams are 
mighty as the power that binds the spheres- 
thou canst change the sleety winds to soothing 
zephyrs, and thou canst melt the icy moun- 
tains of the poles to gentle rains and dewy 
vapors. The granite rocks of the hills are 
upturned by thee, volcanoes burst, islands sink 
and rise, rivers roll, and oceans swell at thy 



30 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

look of command. And oh, thou monarch ol 
the skies, bend now thy bow of milUoned ar- 
rows and pierce, if thou canst, this darkness 
that thrice twelve moons has bound me. Burst 
now thine emerald gates, O morn, and let thy 
dawning come. My eyes roll in vain to find 
thee, and my soul is weary of this intermi- 
nable gloom. My heart is but the tomb of 
blighted hopes, and all the misery of feelings 
unemployed has settled on me. I am misfor- 
tune's child, and sorrow long since marked me 
for her own. The past comes back, robed in 
a pall, which makes all things dark. The 
future seems a rayless night, and the world 
does not always deal gently, even with one so 
sorrowed. 

The sea of feeling, however calm, may be 
rippled by a breath, swollen by a word, clouded 
by a look, and lashed into fury by an act. But 
love like thine, is slow to censure, suspects 
never, and believes not till evidence look 
her so full in the face that there be no room 
for mistake ; and even then she teaches rather 
pity than blame, rather forgives than con 
demns, and lets compassion cover the errors 



JOURNEYING ALONE. 3* 

and faults that Charity cannot hide. Out of 
heaven, and the Bible, there is nothing so pure 
as that love which makes us forget ourselves 
and live unto others. The last time Eve wan 
deied through Eden's bowers of celestial ama- 
ranth, the angels, betokening her departure, 
gave her many flowers, which she twined in 
her hair, and wore on her neck, all, save one, 
a love blossom, which she pressed to her breast, 
and the approving smile of all the angels 
quickened its fainting leaves into life, and it 
took root in her heart; and so, evermore, the 
children of Eve are inclined to love. * * 



Rochester, July 1st, 1847. 

Much-loved Mrs. Buckley, far away : — 
My Institution friends thought it presumptuous 
for me to journey to Rochester alone, and the 
Superintendent laughed when I told him the 
angels would take care of me. Their care was 
needful, too, for I began my journey quite un« 



32 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

incumbered with money, ordinarily so essentia 
to the traveller. The good^ men do should 
be known ; their better deeds often are told. 
,The world has bad notions of itself ; it is not 
a selfish, but an unselfish world — a kind, a 
loving, and a forgiving world — more sunshino 
than storms, more smiles than frowns or tears. 
Men oftener love than hate, oftener do good 
than ill. This is not the best world we are to 
know ; but it is next the best, and only a step 
lies between. Heaven is near the good, so near 
that loved ones, who inhabit there, are with us 
still. Stars unseen hang over us by day ; so 
spirits from beyond the sky hang round our 
pathway, whispering words kind as heaven, 
on every breeze that fans our ears. We hear 
and follow them, but, like Samuel, fancying 
some Eli is calling. 

Wishing to call at Catskill, I went on board 
the Utica. Your father met me there, with 
blessings in his heart and hand. " May God 
preserve and protect you, and in due time re- 
turn you to us," said he, and departed. The 
sun went down ; the moon and stars, those 
symbols of love in heaven, were in the sky ; 



SCENERY OF THE HUDSON. 33 

the air was calm and inviting, even to " spir- 
its of purity." Those whose eyes are folded 
have a quicker sense than sight, by which they 
icnow and feel when a fixed gaze is on them. 
Only one lady remained with me in the cabin ; 
at length, with her babe in her arms, she came, 
and placing her lips close to my ear, as if she 
thought me deaf, screamed, " Be you blind ?" 
" Certainly," I said, smiling. Watching me a 
moment longer, she said, in a tone of sa,tisfac- 
tion, •' Well, I don't judge from your looks you 
feel very bad about it !" " No," I replied, 
" grieving never restores its object, so we must 
learn to bear, and blame not that which we 
cannot change." Presently a Miss, with a voice 
like music's self, placed her little hand in mine, 
saying, " It is delightful out ; I know you can- 
not see the things we are passing, but I will 
describe them to you." I took her arm, and 
we were hardly seated on deck when the Cap- 
tain joined our number, talking familiarly of 
the beautiful scenery which every where adorns 
the Hudson ; "the proudest stream that jour- 
neys to the sea." " Yonder," said he, " is 

Vashington Irving's dehghtful residence, so 

2* 



34 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

buried in shrubs and trees, one can only see 
the steeple ; which has on it a weather-cock 
taken from the ship in which Major Andre was 
to have sailed." A gentleman is most eloquent 
when he has attentive lady listeners ; and 
while we rode over the rippling waters, my 
thoughts gathered many new and beautiful 
images ; and Memory, the mind's mirror, still 
treasures daguerreotypes of them all. 

My visit in Catskill, with Mrs. Wilson and 
daughters, at their cottage home, was like a 
scene in a fairy land. As " distance lends en- 
chantment to the view," so time enhances de- 
parted joys. On board the Alida for Albany, 
blind and alone, among strangers, I began to 
fear lest Mr. Dawson should not get my note 
and come for me at the boat. But the angels 
never fail to do their bidding. Strangers often 
prove the best of friends. '' Lo ! I am with 
you alway !" is not a promise, but a declara* 
tion. Mrs. Thomas, her husband and daugh- 
ter, from New- York, recognizing my baggage- 
mark, sought me out; and, in their society, 
the hours went unnumbered by. When we 
stopped they would have taken me with them 



A KINDLY TREAD. 35 

to Congress Hall, but the Captain kindly of- 
fered, if my friends should not come, to see me 
safe at his home. All left the saloon, but 1 
had not waited long, when a gentleman with 
a kindly tread came, saying, "Your friend, 
Mr. D., is in Michigan, but, if you please, I 
will see you to his residence." He then se- 
cured my baggage, gave me his arm, and we 
were away, talking so familiarly of life, its 
changes, books, and places, that I forgot he 
was a stranger," and thought I had known him 
always. I knew by his voice he had seen 
many years, and by his words, as Pinckney 
says, he had 

" A heart that can feel and a hand that can act." 

He left, saying, " In the morning I will 
either come or send my son with a carriage to 
take you to the depot." My ministering 
angel, this time, was Thurlow Weed, of 
Albany ; and, may the Lord add to the length 
of his days many happy years, and the joys 
of each succeeding be multiplied by the joys 
of the last ! 



36 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

In the forenoon, my seat in the car was 
shared by an aged sire, who beguiled the 
hours with pleasing incidents. In the after- 
noon, a Scotchman, from the banks of the 
Clyde, entertained me with descriptions of the 
Highlands. Eloquent lips are a good substi- 
tute for eyes. He was present when Leopold, 
in sable robes for his Charlotte, was ambas- 
sador for George the Fourth to Edinburgh. 
With the fleetness of fancy, I became not 
only a looker on, but an actor in all that 
brilliant scene. The splendid streets, and edi- 
fices, the dazzling crowd, the royal equipage, 
the high-headed and high-souled officers, the 
elegantly set tables and brilliant guests, he de- 
scribed as if with them but yesterday. Who- 
ever he was, his happiness was greatest when 
contributing most to the happiness of others. 
It would have done your heart good to hear 
him repeat snatches from Burns, in the full 
spirit of the great Poet ; who was, he said, one 
of Nature's own nobility. * * * 

At Pittsford, resting by the way with friends 
of lighter days, a note from Mrs. H., of Ro- 
chester, welcomed me for a time to her home, 



GENESEE. 3*3 

where we read, ride, walk, and talk the days 
aAvay. Lizzy and Mary, too, with gentle 
iiands, come often to lead me by pleasant 
ways; now where the Genesee leaps thunder- 
ing from the rocks, and now where it winds 
noiseless to the sleeping lake, always mention- 
ing in words like pictm*es, every tree, shruh 
and flower. They tell me when we are at the 
corner of a new building, walking to the other 
gives its length, and knowing the number of 
stories, imagination readily makes the view 
her own ; thus I keep in mind the many 
changes of our growing city. If Oswald's 
Corinne was more eloquent she was not more 
kind, nor her love more true. My poor eyes 
cannot see them, but I know looks of love are 
on their faces, such as pitying angels wear. 
Gratitude is the most heavenly inhabitant of 
the human breast, and though shut out from 
its beauties, it is still a blessing to exist in so 
good a world. 

When the Autumn winds begin to moan 
among the trees, the members of the New- 
York Institution for the Blind will meet again 
at their happy home, where may the angels 



38 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

bring you often. Oh ! you never seemed so 
near, so dear, as now. Accept my heart's lovs; 
sealed with a friendship's kiss. As Burns says, 
— " A heart- warm, fond good-by." 

N. B. A lady never writes a letter without 
a postscript. I forgot to tell you that my jour- 
ney home cost me nothing. Captains, railroad 
conductors and all, instead of presenting their 
bills, inquired how they could best serve me, 
where I would stop, &c. Ought not even the 
blind to be joyous and happy in a land so 
kind, so free, as ours ? 

* * * * * 

Our nature is threefold, or in other words^ 
we seem to be made up of three distinct be- 
ings, or sets of energies ; mental, moral, and 
physical ; an d it is the strange mingling and 
commingling of these, and their effects and 
influences upon each other, that produce what 
is called character. When God made man, he 
did not intend his strongest powers should rule, 
but the best ; but contrary to his wish, in most 
persons, the seat of government is planted in 
the mind instead of the h'gart ; and reason is 



EDUCATION. 39 

allowed to sway her glittering sceptre over 
those inhabitants of the soul, love, charity-; 
gjatitude, faith, and hope, which were intend- 
ed to be free, or governed only by heaven's 
golden rules. Byron was an example in 
whose character it was difficult to say whe- 
ther the mental or physical powers had the 
sway ; and so of Pope, and the selfish Wal- 
pole. VTho, in reading the beautiful songs of 
Montgomery and Kirke White, does not feel 
that they came from a source entirely differ- 
ent. Indeed, in the one case we seem com- 
muning with spirits, whose very breath was 
warm with love from heaven ; and in the 
other, with bemgs whose thoughts were in- 
spired only in the gloom of night, and the sul- 
lenness of despair. Now education and man- 
ner of living have much to do with this. If 
books are placed before us which only encour- 
age the ambition, and adorn and dignify the 
mind, and our food be such as stimulates and 
cultivates the less ennobling passions, though 
apparently simple in themselves, they are, 
nevertheless, in their effects lasting as eternity. 
A child, who before his morning meal has 



40 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY 

learned to whisper the name of Jesus in thanK 
fulness and prayer, and at night holds his little 
heart up to God for blessings, when he grows 
to be a man will hardly go astray, or allow 
the impulses of his nature to be governed by 
a thing so cold and calculating as human rea- 
son ; far otherwise ; you will find him inquir 
ing of God, and his own conscience, the way 
of duty, and you will see him always forget 
ting himself and trying to make others happy. 
These thoughts are not too sober even for a 
school-girl ; you are now building a character 
for yourself, of which the lessons and exercises 
of each day form a part. No after time can 
efface the consequences of one act, or the influ- 
ence of one word, either upon ourselves or 
those around us. To get your lessons per- 
fectly and recite them, is not all you have to 
do. A boarding-school is a little community 
by itself, in which each room answers to a 
dwelling, whose inhabitants we may call our 
neighbors ; and here we have a field, into 
which we may bring into exercise all our 
capacities, both mental and moral. Here we 
may plant the germs of philanthropy and reli- 



GUARDIAN ANGELS. 41 

gioiis zeal ; here we may learn to dry away 
the tear of sorrow, and smooth the pillow of 
the sicK, and pity those who suffer. That 
beautiful command, that the strong should 
bear the infirmities of the weak, seems written 
almost expressly for the members of a school, 
for we cannot all gather knowledge with the 
same facility. A lesson that is sport for one, 
is a hard task for another. My dear, we have 
guardian angels who every day bear reports 
to heaven of our doings here, and when the 
books are opened we must answer for the re- 
cord they have kept. From this hour, then, 
seek to know and do the will of your Hea- 
venly Father. First see that your thoughts 
are clothed with the precepts of his word, and 
while you journey upward in life's mountain 
path, set on either side with briers and thorns, 
though your pilgrim feet may be often torn by 
flinty rocks you need not fear ; for our Saviour 
has said, " Lo, I am with you always, even to 
the end of the world." 



42 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY, 

Rochester, Lizzy's Home. 

The friendship of the good is a refuge that 
fails not, a treasure that ai^els prize, and in 
their diadems it is set round with virtue, love, 
and /I'uth. 

My dear Augusta, as the flowers at eve 
incline their heads to departing sunbeams, so 
my spirit is drawn towards you, wander where 
I wilK The love that does not end in this 
life, often ends with it ; but the chain which 
binds our hearts has no broken links, and while 
life lasts, and beyond the sky, it will draw us 
together still. Loved one, where are you? 
Oh speak, I long to hear your words ; they 
were music that fell on my ears and sank 
down into my heart, filling it with joys too 
much like heaven to fade or pass away. It is 
a long time since I have felt your friendly 
arms around my neck, and your kisses on my 
lips, and I often wonder if time and distance 
have not altogether estranged me from your 
thoughts. I know your other self, and those 
little ones who clamber by your side have 
right to the highest seat in your affections ; 



A mother's smile. 43 

and your heart's temple, lighted by a mother's 
smile, should be to them earth's fairest home ; 
and there, dearest, I would have them ever 
stay and worship undisturbed at love's holiest 
altar, only let me share largely in your general 
love, and I shall be therewith content. But 
think of me sometimes, oftenest when you 
bow your heart a,t mercy's throne ; 

Ask for me heaven's blessings there. 
In the ardent hope of faith in prayer. 

I am passing the winter far away by the 
Genesee, where with the wild flowers my 
infancy grew ; to-day the liquid thunders of its 
falls mingle with the winds ; and storms are 
gathering as on the day v/hen you came first 
with books and papers to read to me in the 
New- York Institution for the Blind. No time or 
place is so dear to memory as where the sor- 
rowed heart has been blest, and its burdens 
a while borne by another ; where the bereaved 
feelings have been coaxed to leave their sad- 
aess, and their tears dried by the hand of 
sympathy and love. A stranger in New- York, 



44 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



shut up in that school for the afflicted, how 
found I such a lodgment in your sympathies ; 
and what spirit moved you to come so often to 
beguile my lonely hours ; to take me to your 
pleasant home ; to church, and every where I 
wished to go ? If one good act pleases Goa 
more than another, it must be such forgetful- 
ness of self, such desire to make others happy. 
Last week Mr. and Mrs. H left Roches- 
ter for Boston. The day previous to their 
departure, the Sewing Society of their church 
met at the house of my venerable friend Dr. 
Brown. The weight of years is on him now, 
and his locks are changed to the gray fila- 
ments of wisdom ; but his heart is young, 
and his mind is active as ever : and with the 
sv/eet consciousness of a life well spent, he 
waits only for his Master to call him home. 
Towards evening all the ladies were assem 
bling in the Doctor's room, when Mrs. H ^ 



ignorant of the cause, said to him, " Doctor, 
yon seem to be the greatest attraction of the 
day ;" whereupon an elderly lady entered, 

and approached Mrs. H , bearing in her 

hand a silver waiter, and some napkin rings 



BREAD UPON THE WATERS. 45 

for her children. This needed no explana- 
tion ; their choked feehngs refused words ; the 
light of the past was on them, and with these 
beautiful expressions of gratitude and love 
between them, they and all present wept over 
remembered kindnesses, and ties soon to be 
severed for ever. I said in my heart, behold 
how these sisters love one another, and no 
wonder; their joint labors have clothed the 
destitute, fed the hungry, blessed the siclr, and 
relieved suffering of every order. In a word, 
they have long "shared each other's glad- 
ness, and wept each other's tears." In the 
evening Dr. Brown presented his son for bap- 
tism, a lad of some nine or ten years — the 
child of his old age. Several other parents 
did the same, and thus closed the labors of Mr. 
H. in Rochester. But the good that men do lives 
after them. Like bread upon the waters, il 
not realized now it will be gathered hereafter. 
When Mr. H. came to Rochester, his people 
were few in number, now they are a flourish, 
mg society ; they have a beautiful church, an 
organ, and the largest parish library in the 
city. — But this is little, compared with the 



46 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

hundreds his indefatigable labors have saved 
Irom vice, and the many who by his precept 
and example have learned the luxury of doing 
good. I am passing a few days with my 
friend Lizzy at her new home. 

My poor eyes did not see her exchange her 
hand for another's, but I heard her breathe her 
heart away in words low and truthful as angel 
vows. Her empire now is the domestic circle ; 
her might is gentleness, and by it she winneth 
sway over all hearts that come within her bor- 
ders. Lizzy is reading me Goldsmith, and as 
we turn his pages our gatherings are '■^ gold all 
the way." It is safe reading authors one may 
love as well as their writings. Byron kindled 
his imagination by the dark and turbid waters 
of Acheron. Goldsmith wandered by the 
river of life, where from the fountain of his 
own feelings, and the society of the good, he 
gathered his pure thoughts, and his chaste and 
beautiful play of ideality, which instruct and 
enrapture the reader. Poor Goldsmith, poverty 
and want ever hung heavy at his heart ; and 
his haunts still echo with his groans. But he 
went up the great highway to distinction, and 



MARBLE PAGES. 47 

wreathed upon his brow crowns woven of im- 
mortal laurels. Poverty is truly the cradle of 
genius; man obtains no excellence without 
labor. The master-spirits of all ages, who 
liave dazzled the world with their brilliant 
achievements, had barriers to surmount, diffi- 
culties to remove, and only as they regulated 
their exertions by mental firmness did they 
become learned, great, or good. An ancient 
poet had for his motto, "The daring fortune 
favors." An American divine says, " In great 
and good pursuits, it is honorable, it is right, 
to use that kind of omnipotence which says 1 
tvill, and the work is done." 

Oh my dear Augusta, is it possible I am 
never to read any more ? I forgot to bring a 
volume in raised print from the Institution, but 
passing one's fingers over the pages of a book 
is very unlike the glance of the eye. Last 
summer quite in the verge of autumn, my 
friend Mrs. Snow came with her ponies to take 
me riding. We crossed twipe the Genesee, 
then pursued its windings, till we came where 
the sun's rays were turned away by the forest 
trees ; and the sharp quick noise of the cai- 



48 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

riagc wheels, changed to a muffled rumbUng ; 
and as we rode slowly over the winding roads, 
all was so sacredly silent there, the hushed 
breeze that stirred the leaves seemed the 
breath of prayer. It was Mount Hope, oui 
beautiful home for the dead ; and as we wan- 
dered among the tombs and monuments, my 
fingers read their inscriptions in grooved and 
raised letters. 

" The most beloved of earth not long survive to-day." 

My dear Franky lies there, and her darling 
babe is sleeping by her side ; so quick sorrow 
treads upon the heels of joy. Grave-yards are 
solemn volumes, in which even the blind may 
read upon their marble pages the records of 
hopes all departed. Dear Augusta, mine hour 
of loneliness is passing now, and I feel reluc- 
tant to close this letter as I would an interview 
with yourself When the flowers unfold their 
leaves, and the birds come back again, I shall 
return to the Institution, and resume my ma- 
sic. There I shall be far, far away from my 
Rochester friends, who are so kind, so very 
kind. I often think the v/orld must have 



REVERIE. 49 

grown better since I could see. But, friend of 
my heart, you wiiJ come often to see me, and 1 
shall love you well. 



Instiluiion for the Band. 

My dear Parents far away: — When I 
left your cottage home, the sleety winds of 
early Spring were blowing high, and the Cro- 
cuses were hardly yet above the ground. At 
your little threshold, you kissed me good-by, 
and I felt your tears warm on my cheelis. 
You pressed my hands, and father said, God 
bless you, my child, and I rode away. Words 
are not feelings, so I can never make you know 
the strange sensations that nestled in my soul, 
while I crossed the hills that windy day. 
Sometimes I fell into mysterious reveries, and 
fancied my journey home, my stay with you, 
and my depariurc, all an unfinished dream, 
and thought soon to awaken and find it so. 
Then I changed my position, and tried to open 
my eyes to see if the morning had not com(^. 
3 



50 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Then I heard distinctly the rumbhng of the 
stage wheels, the rattling of the harness, and 
the tread of the horses, and cracking of the 
diiver's whip, and the frequent passing of far- 
mers' teams ; no I said this is real^ I am not 
dreaming. Then I turned my face to the 
stage window, and felt the biting wind as it 
whistled by, but all around and above I could 
see nothing but clouds of folding darkness, 
'^^rhen I sank back, and my spirit reeled be- 
neath the awful weight of conscious blindness 
which like a mountain seemed falling on me, 
and hiding me from the world for ever. Still 
I did not weep. I have no longer any tears to 
shed. My heart has known a grief so burn- 
ing, that dews and moisture never more gather 
there. Like a seared forest its blossoms are 
all faded, and its leaves are withered and 
fallen *****. I remain two weeks by the 
banks of the Guenaugua. 

The night before my departure, some fa- 
vored ones of Apollo sang under my window 
that sweetest of songs, 

" We will welcome thee back again;" 



WORDS ARE NOT FEELINGS. 51 

and another, only one couplet of which I re- 
member, 

" 'Tis needful we watch thee by day. 
But the Angels will keep thee by night." 

Professions of love and friendship cost us 
nothing. Words are wind, and feelings are 
only natural swellings of the heart; but acts 
are living things, like facts they are stubborn 
and everlasting, and good deeds are footsteps 
in the ladder which reaches heaven. I cannot 
count the days of my stay at Geneva, for hap- 
piness keeps no dial, and always forgets to 
number the hours. If the scenery of a place 
over gives tone to the minds and hearts of its 
inhabitants, I am sure the beautiful Seneca 
has lent its look of love to those who dwell by 
its shore. On their homes may the rains and 
dews never cease to fall, and the light of health 
and peace never leave their brows. Eliza 
read to me nearly two volumes of Littell's 
I .iving Age. In one of the back numbers. Fa- 
ther, you will find a review of Swedenborg. 
I wish you would read it, and Avrite me what 
you think of it. I send with this a volume of 



52 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Macaulay's Miscellanies. I know you will be 
pleased with what he says of the hfe and times 
of Milton and Cromwell. But in arder to en- 
'oy his reviews generally, one must divest his 
mind of all prejudice, and harbor only a sphit 
of liberal Christianity and free toleration, fur 
such is certainly the spirit of the great author. 
The type is very fine, but I think, by the aid 
of your new glasses, you will be able to read 
it. But you must remember. Father, that you- 
physical energies are not what they were 
twenty, or even ten years ago; besides, eyes 
both younger and stronger than yours are 
often materially injured by lamp light. Mary 
must read for you evenings ; that will relieve 
you and improve her. Nin writes that she has 
nearly completed the works of Hannah More, 
and the poems of Mrs. Hemans. Though she 
may never possess the elegance and varied 
learning of the one, nor the beautiful genius of 
the other, still like them both, I hope, she will 
try to live such a life only as woman should 
live, adorned by every virtue, and marred by 
no error. Brother must not think he has com« 
pleted all of Parley's tales, because he has read 



REMINISCENCES* 53 

one little book through. I do not Know now 
many volumes there are, but they altogether 
make quite a library, and they contain a vast 
.ieal of excellent reading, both for old and 
young. 



Neio-York Institution f 01 the Blind. 

Dear Cora : — The murmurs of the Genesee 
are in my thoughts to-night, and voices dear 
as home-words, have been falling on my ear, 
till I seem again surrounded by those who 
pitied and loved me long ago ; Avhose homes 
were ever open for my reception, and their 
hands were never wearied with ministering to 
my wants. ^ 

The impressions of sound are much deeper 
and more lasting than those of sight, conse- 
quently the memories of the blind are always 
keepsakes of the heart. Another year has gone 
by, and I have yet no abiding place, save in 
the sympathies of friends — but like the wound- 
ed oyster who lines his shell with pearl, I 
would, by gentle love, make the dwellings I 



54 \ PLACE IN THY MEMORY 

inhabit more pure and white. We cease to 
Uve when we have no longer something io do 
or bear ; then why flee from ill, or pity those 
who suffer ? Dews of the night are diamonds 
at morn, so the tears we weep here may be 
pearls in heaven ; and we have httle cause to 
mourn over the wreck of hopes, when it opens 
the heart to a brighter sunshine, whose warm 
hght melts its ice to running streams, and cov- 
ers its crags and cliffs with blossoms, and plants 
along its rough ways trees whose fruits and 
leaves are for the healing of the nations. 

On Thanksgiving day, through the kindness 

of Mr. Dean, I heard Mr. . New- York 

has many eloquent men, but I have never 
heard one whose style is so richly beautiful, 
whose words are so select, and whose zeal 
seems so perfectly what the apostle calls ac- 
cording to knowledge. Tolerant towards all 
denominations, liberal in his views, more than 
cordial in his feelings, he seems to have a heart 
that could gather in all the world, and ye* 
have room to spare. 

I love such spirits ; they are the lights of the 
ago ; beings whom heaven has destined '■ to 



THANKSGIVING. 55 

leave foot-prints on the sands of time ;" way- 
marks to all who would be wise, great, and 
good. 

Mr. is but a few weeks home from 

Europe, and his imagery seems fresh as the 
sunny vales of England, grand as the glaciers 
of Switzerland, sublime as the scenery of the 
Rhine, clear and enrapturing as Italy's bowers 
where her time-honored painters drew, and 
where the sons of genius from all lands go to 
worship at the shrine of Art. 

For a northern Thanksgiving dinner, roast 
turkey is always first in the bill of fare. 

My friend Mr. B , with whom I dined, is a 

right true son of Johnny Bull as ever lived ; 
whole-souled, whole-hearted, speaks alv/ays 
what he thinks, acts just as he feels, and his 
hospitality makes one as perfectly at home as 

himself Mrs. B reminds me of what 1 

once heard a Swede say of his countrywoman, 
Prederica Bremer ; in the character of all per- 
sons, we ever find some one or more distin- 
guishing trait, but in the soul of Prederica 
heaven has happily blended all excellence. 

In the. afternoon Mrs B- — and I visited 



56 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

the paintings at the Art Union ; she was eyes 
for me, and beautifully described all she saw 
The most clever thing in the exhibition is the 
Mother's Prayer, which, while you gaze upon 
it, seems to breathe, as though touched by the 
pencil but now. I know not which to envy 
most, the purchaser or the artist, who, by the 
way, is an American. Another fine thing is the 
" Young Mechanic," by Mr. Smith, of Ohio ; 
but perhaps the most famous work of all, is the 
" Yoyage of Life," by Mr. Cole. The design 
is the Stream of Life, bearing on its rippled 
bosom a little boat, and in it an infant and an 
angel to guide. Farther on, the impetuous 
youth seats himself at the helm, dashes fu- 
riously on amidst rocks and breakers, so on 
down to tranquil old age, where all is calm 
and peaceful, and from the spirit-world which 
opens above, angels have come to beckon him 
away. 

On our way from the gallery we chancec 
to pass the old Blind Harper, whose voice, like 
the strings of his worn harp, was trembling in 
the breeze ; and while I listenBd to his sacred 
song, lie seemed so like the weary pilgrim I 



THE WORN HARP. 57 

liad just heard described waiting on the boat, 
I ahnost fancied the angels above watching 
the close of his strain, to present him a new 
harp, tuned for ever to the praise of God and 
the Lamb. * * * * 

At our last examination I met your friend 
Mr. G , of Brooklyn, who is ever a wel- 
come visitor at the New- York Institution for 
the Blind. His voice is a sort of watchword, 
at which the little folks quit their play, leave 
school and music, and run to greet him. Oh ! 
could you see him once throw down his rolls 
and bundles filled with new dresses, <fcc., and 
to their infinite delight unburden his generous 
pockets of crackers, nuts, apples, and candies, 
some falling upon the floor, after which they 
all scramble, playing the kitten, as Mary says 
v/hen she drops her ball, until they find them. 
As the heavens are higher than the earth, so 
are God's ways above our ways ; it is not the 
most useful who stay longest in the world, or 
lo whom the power of doing good is longest 

preserved. Mr. G , you are aware, is well 

known as a philanthropist, and a lover of man- 
kind. No heart sympathizes more deeply with 



58 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

suifering than his. and no hand is open moifl 
readily and more widely to relieve it. 

As the gifted Euler, in the Academy of 
Sciences in St. Petersburgh, saw his figures 
and angles fade, and all objects of sight pass 

into dim distance, so Mr. G tells me, the 

slow but sure hand of cataract is weaving her 
veils before his sight, which science has never 
reached and surgery has rarely turned away. 
Already the morning shines but dimly, the 
noon is painfully bright, the night shades are 
thick and foggy, his way is uncertain, and the 
faces of familiar friends look strangely, and not 
-ill they speak does he know one from the 
other. One hath said — 



" to die is nothing, 

But to live and not see is misfortune." 

But it will not be so with Mr. G . As 

Huber knew bees and their habits before his 

blindness, so Mr. G has learned the ways 

and the wants of the poor. And when the 
hght shall cease to stream in upon his mind, 
the gladdened smile of the widow and orphan 



AS I SAW THEM LAST. 59 

Will be to his heart a sunshine, as pure and 
lasting as love in heaven. Adieu, Cora. 

November, 1848. 



Rochester, Carry's Home. 

My School Friend Laura : — It is pleas- 
ant to be even the sport of a chance breeze, 
while it continues to sit one down by pleasant 
places. You must know I have become a per- 
fect wanderer ; claiming no abiding place with 
any sect, or people ; passing the time, however, 
always with the good, as invitations favor. 

They tell me gratitude — that holiest of 
heavenly emotions — is too much the theme of 
my letters ; that I give words of thanks and 
praise to every body who is kind, all unmindful 
that green-eyed prejudice is still in the world. 
But, they who say thus should know, years 
have gone by since even a harsh word has 
fal.on on my ears — since I have seen a frown- 
ing face, a look of anger or revenge. The 
sold, the unfeeling, whose souls are peopled 
with selfishness and haughty pride, never seek 



60 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

the friendship of the bUnd, but, hke Priests and 
LeviteS; pass on the other side. So you see 1 
am necessarily always with the good ; for they 
aloue find pleasure in contributing to the hap- 
piness of one, who can make no return for their 
multiplied favors. Miss Ferrier says beauti- 
fully in her " Marriage," " As the ancients held 
sacred the oak riven by the lightning, so a 
delicate mind always regards one who has 
been afiiicted, as if touched by the hand of 
God himself." 

We are creatures of habit, and form our no- 
tions of the world from what we see of it. 
Wonder not, then, if I call it only bright and 
beautiful. Those around may wear looks of 
sadness ; may grow old ; their teeth fall ; their 
eyes become dim, and their locks gray ; wrin- 
kles may be on their brows, trace-marks of 
grief and care ; but they look not so to me. 
The last time I saw the green earth, and its 
inhabitants, they wore yet the sunny hues of 
innocence and gladness, Avith which unsus- 
pecting youth covers all things. And so they 
seem to me now ; and were I to bear a report 
to heaven, I sh-ould call this a charming world, 



THE PLACE OP PRAYER. 61 

a kind, a loving, and a forgiving world ; I 
should say men oftener love than hate, oftener 
do good than ill. 

*' Long, long be my heart with such memories filled, 
Like the vase in which roses have once been distilled. 
You may break, you may ruin the vase if you will. 
But the scent of the roses will hang round it still." 

It is Saturday, Laura, the preparation day 
of the Jews. A March morning, more lovely 
and clear, never graced an Italian sky. The 
ice-bands of the Genesee are broken, and its wa- 
ters roll on, tossing liquid gems to the sun- 
beams. Robins, the first warblers among the 
leafless trees, are welcoming the Spring. 

I have been with Lizzy and Carry to the 
place of prayer, and the solemnities of the 
liouse of God are still on my thoughts. White- 
haired age, and the young, were there, inquir- 
ing "what shall we do to be saved?" Mr. 
Wisner opened the exercises with the words, 
" Seek me early, and ye shall surely find me." 
Mr. Shaw followed, addressing himself most 
afFectingly to the youth of his congregation ; 
ihildren of the Covenant. Miss Allen arose, 



62 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

and in tears, meekly asked the people of Gk)Q 
to pray for the young ladies of her school, 
many of whom had accompanied her, seeking 
Jesus, whom to know aright is life eternal. 
" Blessed are the pure for they shall see God." 
This reminded me of like scenes in the old 
Seminary Chapel, where we so often assembled 
for prayers ; when not one was left in the 
school who had not learned to pray and tasted 
that the Lord is good. The voices of those 
pious teachers. Professor Hoyt, Professor Whit- 
lock, &c. ; their lessons of instruction, their 
precious counsels, clustered around my heart, 
until it seemed " all life's scattered sweets were 
gathered into that one hour." Laura, now the 
sky is covered over with clouds, rain-drops are 
falling fast. Oh ! that the dews of heavenly 
love, and the sweets of pardon, would so de- 
scend upon the earth, making it all like a well- 
watered garden, producing abundantly the 
fruits of righteousness. 

As in nature, the brightest sunshine casts 
the deepest shadow, so human life is made up 
of contrasts of lights and shades, calms and 
storms, smiles and tears. Laura, we met amid 



BE BIBLE STUDENTS. 63 

scenes of mirth^ we were happy, we were gay. 
We often met, and at every meeting gained 
something for our friendship's storage. You 
are still in the temple where we worshipped at 
the shrine of knowledge. The future is bright 
before you, and its symbols are big with joyous 
meaning. But, Laura, were I to ask a boon 
for thee, it would not be a life free from ad- 
verse winds and storms. Joy hath her minis- 
ters, but grief alone subdues and restrains ^;he 
spirit. As the rod of the sainted Hebrew 
brought gushing waters from the rock, so 
sorrow moves the feeling fountains of the 
heart. While refreshing your mind at the 
springs of Castalia, forget not the once fare- 
well words of our good Professor Seager, 
" First of all be Bible students." Ignorance 
of any thing else may be palliated, bat if we 
lack knowledge of the Scriptures, we have 
no excuse, no pardon. Read often, then, 
the Word of God. It will add wisdom to 
your thoughts, peace to your xife, and thereby 
good will come unto thee, and thy days shall 
be long upon the earth. 



64 1 PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



Friend Raymond : — I am again in New* 
York, the city of lights and fountains. Again 
in the Institution, that is real, that is true, but 
not sad. — Happiness does not so much depend 
upon circumstances as we think. Within our 
own hearts the fountain must well, else no 
number of tributaries can long keep alive its 
joyous gushings and laughing streams. 

Our promenade grounds, in the rear of the 
Institution, covering several acres, are planted 
with trees from all quarters of the world, as are 
those who wander in their shade. The Ailan- 
thus from China, the Catalpa from Japan, the 
silver-leaved Poplar and Abele from the South, 
the European Linden and Norway Fir, and 
the Maple and Elm from our own forests. 
The front yard is laid out with beautifully 
gravelled walks, and circles set round with 
shrubs and flowers. Our best of friends, Mr. 
Dean, who planted them, comes often to tell 
us of their beauties, their virtues and their na- 
tive homes. But the old gardener, who has 
oeen servant in the Institution from first to 



THE OLD GARDENER. 65 

last, when the flowers faded and the Autumn 
winds had strewed the ground with leaves, 
dead honors of the trees, the old man laid him 
down to die. No more he comes to teach our 
truant feet where not to tread, and our hands 
to find the fairest blossoms. He was a son of 
Erin, green isle of the sea ! and next his God, 
he loved his country. His history is to us all 
a mystery ; but this we know, he had seen 
much of the world, knew much of men and 
manners. In his exile, books were his com- 
panions, and his well worn Bible still lies in 
the kitchen window, all unread and uncared 
for now. 

The Croton is here, too, jetting its limeless 
waters in every part of the building ; and the 
little boys say more birds come here to sing 
this summer than ever before ; perhaps be- 
cause the trees have grown thicl^er and higher. 
Prof. Root, the vocalist, sings with us two 
hours every morning. — Prof. ReifF, a German, 
who has for many years had entire control of 
the musical department, is with us still. If 
the consciousness of making others happy is 
earth's purest happiness. Professor Reiff must 



G6 A PLACK IN THY MEMORY. 

be blessed indeed. To how many of the BUnd 
has he given employment, and made theii 
hearts vibrate for ever with the melodies of 
song ? Oh, could you hear him play once, you 
would think as 1 often do : he will have little 
^ause for complaint if, up in heaven, the an- 
gels do not present him with a jiew harp, but 
let him keep his old one. 

Miss Swetland, our preceptress, has returned 
from her tour South. Escaping the rigors of 
a northern winter has somewhat improved her 
health. Our leisure hours she beguiles with 
amusing incidents of her travels, visits to the 
Capitol, Mrs. Polk's levees, etc. Miss S. di- 
vided the winter months between Charleston 
and Washington, and as you may easily im- 
agine, gathered much to interest those whose 
little world lies almost within these walls. 

Last week, Gen. Scott and his Aids paid us 
a visit. The Band received him with " Hail 
to the Chief !" When passing them, the Gen- 
eral took off his hat and bowed, which they 
unanimously returned. The members of the 
Band are all blind, and how knew they when 
to return his bow ? Were not their spirits con- 



THE HERO OF LUNDY's LANE. 67 

scious of the deference a greater spirit was 
paying them? The soul immortal has eyes 
mdependent of the body, which hke the quick 
spirits of the Universe, do neither sleep nor 
slumber, and no blindness can darken them. 
Th<B particulars of the General's visit the pub- 
lic prints have already given you. Mr. Cham- 
berlain, after introducing the great Hero, ad- 
dressed him so beautifully in our behalf, that 
I must give you a copy of his words as nearly 
as I can recall them. 

" Allow me, sir, on behalf of the managers, 
the officers and the pupils of this Institution, 
to bid you a cordial welcome. Although cut 
off from many sources of information enjoyed 
by our fellow-countrymen, with the history of 
your life, identified as it is with some of the 
brightest pages of our country's history, we are 
not unacquainted. All have heard of Fort 
Erie and of the Heights of Queenston ; of the 
plains of Chippewa and of the sanguinary con- 
test of Lundy's Lane. With our fingers we 
have traced the progress of that brave army, 
which from the storming of Vera Cruz to the 
capture of Mexico, you have led to triumph 



68 \ PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

and to glory; and we have heard, too, that 
when " red field was won," and patriotism had 
sheathed her victorious sword, the claims of 
humanity were not forgotten. We have heard 
that the same heart which in the iron tempest 
of battle was firm as adamant, could dissolve 
in tenderest sympathy by the couch of the 
wounded and dying. All this, sir. we have 
heard, and while we have not admirea the 
Hero less, we have loved the man more. It is 
for this, sir, that we cherish the name of Win- 
field Scott; one of the noblest names that 
fame has ever inscribed upon our national 
escutcheon ; 

' One of the few, the immortal names. 
That were not born to die.' 

" But I am reminded that of these precious 
moments very few can be accorded to us, and 
before we bid you adieu, I would crave one 
boon in behalf of my sightless charge. Some 
of these, when you shall have filled up the 
measure of your fame, and to you the praise 
and censure of man will be alike indifferent, 
will survive ; and when they shall recount 



CHIPPEWA AND CERRO GORDO. 69 

your achievements, and tell to coming genera- 
tions, of Chippewa and of Cerro Gordo, and of 
Oontreras, and the many other fields where 
yon have covered the proud flag of our coun- 
try with imperishable glory, I would have 
them say, too, that once, at least, it was their 
fortune to listen to the tones of that voice whose 
word of command was ever to the brave the 
talisman of assured victory." 

Gen. Scott's reply was very concise and 
aflecting. All his remarks I do not remember, 
but he said he knew by the light of our faces 
that our enjoyments, though perhaps more pen- 
sive than those of persons who see, are not 
less elevated and refined. Religion, God and 
the Bible were so much the themes of his re- 
marks, one would sooner have thought him a 
priest, than a General from the field of battle. 
When he resumed his seat Fanny was intro- 
duced to him, and recited a poem which she 
had prepared for his reception. She alluded 
to the soldiers revelling in the halls of Monte- 
zuma. The General afterwards remarked : 
" we did not revel in the Halls of Montezuma, 
but subsisted on one meal a day ; and when 



70 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

the battle ended went down on om* knees, as 
all good Christians and soldiers shouid do, and 
returned thanks, and sought the blessing of 
God.*' If analyzed, were their thanks for their 
own escape, or for their success in disposing of 
their enemies ? Even soldiers should lemem- 
ber, " God takes no thanks for murder." The 
General let Fanny take his sword ; she un- 
sheathed it; and raising it high, exclaimed, 
" You are my prisoner." The great man re- 
plied, " I always surrender to the ladies at dis- 
cretion." He then joked her something about 
the beaux. Fanny said to him, I have never 
yet seen a gentleman who quite suited my 
fancy. This put the house in a roar of laugh- 
ter, and such a volley of cheers you never 
heard. I could not see the General to judge ol 
his height, but I fancy he must be to the new 
world what Saul was to the old, •' head and 
should(3rs above all other men." 



«UR NIGHT IS UNENDING. 71 



Rochester Willow Bank, March, 1848. 
My dear, very dear Mary: — We, whose 
eyes are closed, have but two divisions of time 
— a noisy night and a quiet one. Morning 
comes, and the hght streams in sunny rills 
over all the gladsome earth. Long ago, Mary, 
we two awoke, ere the sun had kissed the 
dews into vapor, and ran joyous to greet the 
faces of those we loved, refreshed and beauti- 
fied by a night of slumbers. And oh, do you 
remember, Mary, how from the opened doors, 
in rushed, like resisted waters, a flood of golden 
light? When far o'er the green hills, the full 
orbed sun showered his splendors; and high 
up the blue sky, fleecy clouds were flying ; and 
among the trees merry birds were singing — 
and on the flowers, busy bees their nectar 
draughts were sipping, and all the insect tribes 
were humming, and we, too, in girlhood glee, 
went singing. How joyful, oh, how joyful, is 
the morning ! But now it is not so ; oui' night 
is unending. Days steal on us — and steal from 
us. We sleep and awaken; but no change 



li- A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

comes. No flowers spring up in our path; no 
garden walks or fields unfold their colors ; no 
mountains rise — no rivers roll nor oceans swell. 
To usj beauty hath veiled her face, and grana- 
eur and sublimity, have passed away. Yes, 
Mary, all things have passed away. The 
moon has left the sky, and all the constellated 
stars have gone down for ever ; so the bright 
dreams of our youth have fled ; and promised 
joys come not. All around are blithe and gay, 
but from morn till eve, Mary, we move cau- 
tiously and pensively. Our truant feet often 
go astray, and we know not when danger is 
nigh. As the chained eaglet looks heaven- 
ward, and stretches out its wing in fancied 
freedom, so we sometimes intercept the flight 
of time — and live forgetful in light, and joy, 
and hope, only to return and weep in darkness 
more dark, and loneliness more lonely. But 
Mary, our darkness, like the clouds, must have 
its sunny side, for God takes blessings from us 
only when their absence is the greater blessing; 
sorrow sanctified, quickens into newness of 
life, the better feelings of our nature, — and 
Mary, does it not make us love our friends and 



ONE MOMENT OF SIGHT. 73 

all the world more ; and go not our thoughts 
oftener up to God and heaven? Imagination, 
(hp.t sublime radius of the soul, is every day 
taking to herself a broader sweep; piercing 
eyen the sepulchre of the buried past — and 
treading fearless, within the boundary of the 
unseen. Science or art, or earth or sky, have 
no treasured worth, nor hidden beauty, that 
fancy, m her tleetness, does not picture in 
colors brighter far, than open eyes can see, 
and as flowers from the depths of the ocean, 
come floating o'er the swelling tide, so beauti- 
ful images from the long-forgotten past, glad- 
den now our searching memories. Galileo, 
who saw more than all the world before him, 
and opened the eyes of all after him, from the 
top of his prison, with the instrument his own 
hands had made, watched the wheeling orbs 
above, until his eyes became opaque as the 
satellites he discovered; in his woes he cried. 
Oh, ye Gods, for power to look once more into 
ihe serene depths of the clear night heaven! 
If we may judge from his frequent and happy 
descriptions of its beauties, Milton would have 

given all other sights for the glorious morning, 
4 



74 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Sanderson desired only once to look along the 
pages of a book, and I have heard you say 
Mary, you would rather see the flowers, than 
all the world beside ! But oh ! if I were to be 
blessed with one moment of sight, I wouid 
pray, let me look again into the face of a che- 
rished friend — a pair of soul-lit eyes, beaming 
with intelligence and love ; whose spirit-glances 
imagination cannot picture, and things so holy, 
unsanctified memory may not treasure. Oh, 
what saddened feelings steal upon us, when, 
with ravished ears, we listen to descriptions of 
paintings on the v/alls, and rainbows on the 
clouds. But, Mary, have you never thought 
the angels are always nearer then, to bear our 
thoughts away, where light is, that fades not? 
Where the painter, with his brush of divine 
art, dipped in color's native well, sketches holy 
imagery; scener}^ of heaven, where deathless 
flowers bloom by living fountains, and the fair 
forms of the blest, when dayspring's fragrant 
dews hang impearled upon their seraph locks ! 
Where the poet, seated upon some blissfu 
mound, writes while the inspirations of holy 
genius burn along his lines, where Truths, 



THE WELCOME VISITOR. 75 

intc which philosophers here look and grow 
bewildered with their depth, we shall there ex- 
plore, invited by the voice of Him who sits in 
majesty enthroned, and sways over earth and 
heaven his potent rule ; whose creating hand 
moulds worlds, and tosses them into the fields 
of ether pensile hung; "clothes the lilies of 
the field, and tempers the winds to the shorn 
lamb." 

Mary, life is what we make it; shut out 
from all that is external, we are pretty much 
the creators of the world we live in. Let us 
see to it then, that we be good creators. Since 
day and night are the same, we can as well 
people our minds with the beams of the one, 
as the clouds of the other ; as well call back 
images of joy and gladness, as those of grief 
and care. The latter, however, may some- 
times be our guests to sup and dine, but let 
them never be permitted to lodge with us. 
We came forth in childhood's morn to gather 
dowers, and because on our way we have 
dropped a few, we will not sit down and weep 
over the lost, but rather amuse ourselves by 
counting and admiring those we have left. 



76 A PLACfi IN THY MEMORY. 

Blindness makes us painfully dependent; but 
God forbid our hearts miu:mur, or our lips 
complain. " The earth is the Lord's and the 
fulness thereof." The cattle upon a thousand 
hills are his ; running waters and greeu pas- 
tures are in his hands, and even now, he may 
be leading us hither, by ways we have not 
known ! In the love and sympathy of friends, 
who every where hasten to do us kindness, 
we have a well-spring of pleasure, inexhaust- 
ible as the good feelings of the human heart. 
Cora is an angel of patience, Mary, or I had 
not written you so long a letter. Her little 
hand must be weary, though she says no, and 
when I complain of troubling her, she folds 
her arms around my neck and whispers, af- 
flicted friends are our ministering spirits — for 
IIS they languish — for us they die. 

Mary, it is four by the clock, and I fancy 
myself again in the Institution parlor, drum- 
ming a piano lesson, as if noise were its only 
object. Now opens the door; Kitty, Libby, 
Josey, and Susa, all in the same breath inquire, 
Mr. Dean? Mr. Dean? No; he has not come 
yet; away they run and presently return with 



WHAT HAS HE NOW T 77 

some dozen more ; now they are not mistaken ; 
his well-known tread in the hall they heard, 
and his voice guides them to his arms ; some 
are in his lap, others hang around his chair ; 
all expect a kiss, a kind word ; yes, and some- 
thing more. — Look! what has he now for 
these, his pet children? Pine-apples, bananas, 
figs, oranges ! These with a father's fondness 
he divides, answering meantime their many 
questions of the people who grow and gather 
such delicious fruits; how preserved, where 
procured, (fee. — But where is Charley, the pet 
of all the house? forgive the little rogue, he 
has gone trudging up the long stairs with a 
heart full of complaint to Miss Wild, that his 
apron-pockets ain't " bigger enough. ''^ Patting 
them on the head affectionately, Mr. Dean 
says, go away now my children to your play, 
while I read a little to these larger girls ; bless 
his heart ! some choice book we know, perhaps 
just from the press ; and as we sit encircled 
round, hour after hour goes unheeded by, till 
late in the evening we bid him good night at 
the yard gate. It is a long walk to Mr. Dean's 
mansion, but happy thoughts, like good society, 



78 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY 

always annihilate time and distance. Oh: 
Mary, is it not heart-mending to live over in 
after time, seasons of such rich enjoyment. I 
often wonder who comes to read for you on 
Sabbath evenings, now our friend Mr. Muriay 
has made his home in Oswegc. We nevei 
forget those to whom we have been truly kind ; 
so we will hope thoughts of those whom his 
frequent visits made so happy, will come to 
him sometimes even there. Yesterday, two 
Canaries were presented me ; one I shall bring 
to you, and the other to Ann. Their voices 
are equalled in sweetness by none but your 
own. Pardon me, if I flatter, but 1 could not 
compliment their musical powers more, or des- 
cribe them to you better. — Remember me kind- 
ly to all in the Institution, and say, in the 
month of roses I shall again be with them. 
Good-by, Mary. 



Neio-York Institution for the Blind. 

Friend Carrie, — In the light of many 
memories I sit me down to write you. The 
holidays came, and all were again abroad foi 



THE OLD DUTCH CUSTOM. 79 

a little season of pleasure, and I need not tell 
you that the Institution began to seem lonely 
enough, to those too far from home and friends 
tjo share with them the recreations of the sea- 
son ; when to my delight Mr. H. M. Whitney, 
of Rochester, came and escorted me over to 
Brooklyn. The old Dutch custom of devoting 
the first day of the New Year exclusively to 
calling, for the gentlemen, is still kept up with 
much enthusiasm in New- York and Brooklyn. 
For this one day in the year at least, the ladies 
do turn democrats, and with open doors and 
hearts receive with free toleration, all those 
who choose to look in upon them. It is a nice 
way too of adding new acquaintances to one's 
list ; for instance, if there chance to be a strange 
family in the neighborhood, or church, and a 
gentleman, by introduction or otherwise, pays 
the lady a New Year's call, she soon after, if 
the acquaintance be a desirable one, returns 
the obligation by calling at his house. 

There was never a brighter winter morning 
than dawned with the new year. Broadway 
was one grand masquerade. Proteus had less 
shapes than the fashions of its equipage. 



80 A PLACE IN THY MExMORY. 

Heads of buffaloes, bears, lions, and tiger}?; 
were mounted on every stage-coach, omnibus, 
and all sorts of vehicles that go on wheels oi 
runners. I do not mean that these creatures 
were really abroad so uncaged, but lesser ani- 
mals, you know, sometimes wrap tnemselves 
in the skin of the stronger, and go about like 
the sheep in wolf's clothing. 

4mong the many who called on my friends 
Mrs. Barnes and her sister, was the learned 
Professor Davies. Mathematicians are not al- 
ways social in their feelings, fertile m imagi- 
nation, or fluent in speech ; but I have seldom 
met so cordial, warm-hearted, and happy man 
in conversation, as Professor Davies. Listen- 
ing to him, you would think he numbers all 
the fine arts in his string, and his formulas 
and infinite series besides. By some associa- 
tion, the cause of my blindness was asked ; 
whereupon I told the good Professor plainly, 
that I believed he had something to do with it ; 
that I strove too hard to see the end of his 
mathematical course, and after passing many 
wearisome days and nights with his too fasci- 
nating Legendre, Bourdon, surveying, and cal- 



THE VEGETARIAN. 81 

cuius of radicals, an irritation by weeping and 
a slight cold darkened my eyes for ever. Now, 
Carr»ie, if I could only manage to demonstrate 
to the Professor, by one of his own formulas, 
that he was, in point of fact, the original cause 
of my blindness, I see no reason why I should 
not send in my bill to him ; and how much 
should it be ? Really, one could not think of 
asking less than a thousand dollars for a pair 
of hazel orbs, such as mine were, always bright 
with looks of gladness, to say nothing of their 
usefulness ; and that sum, Carrie, would make 
me independently rich,— for you must know, 
since Mr. Dean sent me to the water-cure 
establishment, I have learned to live without 
meat, butter, salt, lea or coffee; quenching 
my thirst always, as Kirke White says, " luxu- 
rious from the limpid wave." And according 
to Graham's computation, a true vegetarian 
ean fare sumptuously as need be upon fifteen 
dollars per year ; and, certainly, the difference 
between that and seventy would clothe one, 
and pocket m.oney beside. God grant that little 
fortune may yet be mine ; then I shall be the 
happiest creature alive. 
4* 



82 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Well, we had other calls, too ; the gahant 
the brave, the young, the gifted, and fascinat 
ing, all pouring in pell-mell, by the score and 
dozens, with a "happy New Year" on theii 
lips, music in their voices, and their brows 
clothed with smiles, new from the fair faces 
they had just left. 

It is astonishing how many words and ideas 
can be exchanged in a little time when both 
parties are agreeably excited. Seemingly, in 
five minutes. Dr. Powers gave us a synopsis 
of the diiferent modes of observing the day in 
all the countries of Europe. The polished 
Marquand introduced us to Paris scenes so 
familiarly, that we seemed almost enjoying her 
dazzling fetes. Mr. Humphrey, of Amherst, 
talked of paintings, then the classics, the land 
of marvels, and our genius, Powers, in Flor- 
ence ; and lastly, reference was made to the 
New England festival, where I believe he was 
toasted "orator of the day." Lawyer Burr 
had on his sunniest face ; though emphatically 
a man of the world, a calculating and specu- 
lative disciple of Blackstone, yet no laugh was 
BO merry as his, and no efforts to please more 



THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. 88 

Heartfelt. I envy you such an uncle ; and 
why should I not ? Just think of his holiday 

gifts ; Mrs. B 's hundred dollar ring, and 

Emma's pearl and feather fan, and splendid 
books beside. 

Sunday morning we went to the Mission 
Siinday School, the children of which are ga- 
thered from the highways and hedges. Could 
you see these little ones in their cellar homes, 
and contrast them now in the cheerful Sunday 
School. The hand of benevolence has washed 
them from their filth, put on them comely gar- 
ments, and set their feet in new shoes, and 
while I listened to them repeating the A, B, C, 
and reading stammeringly, verses of Scripture, 
they seemed a cabinet of un wrought jewels, 
and every lesson a touch from the hand of the 
polisher, revealing some new and heavenly 
oeauty. The school at present numbers one 
hundred and fifty-seven, taught and sustained 
by those of all denominations, who, like the 
great Teacher of mankind, love to do good. 
Mr. Barnes, for a New Year's gift, presented 
each of them, one of Mrs. Sherwood's stories 
for children. Poverty is a school, but her dis- 



84 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

cipline is not always healthful to the mind and 
heart ; too often her children become proficients 
in art and deceit, which they through life prac- 
tise upon an unsuspecting world. Even there 
a child, too provident, was found smuggling a 
second book to sell on the morrow, as she said, 
for a penny to buy bread. Children can be 
drawn and kept in the right way only by the 
cord of love, and their waywardness should 
be checked by the same. My lips will never 
cease to whisper blessings on the members of 
the Mission Sunday School ; and may God 
love Smd bless them too. 

Friend Carrie, believe always, that I love 
you. With the compliments and good wishes 
of the season, 

T am affectionately yours. 



Institution for the Blind. 

Many things are dark to sorrow, but no! 

all : even blindness has its morning and its 

evening. — True, at night we cannot see the 

stars in their blue homes, nor the sun at morn ; 



CLOSE OF THE DAY. 85 

yet they both have many voices, and when 
the eye is turned away, the ear affords new 
avenues to the heart, through which the spirit, 
though a prisoner, may become elevated and 
happy. 

New- York Institution for the Bhnd seems a 
paradise, where purity dwells, peace and con- 
tent rule all hearts, and love is our guardian 
angel. — The murmur of the Hudson blends 
with the breeze, and high in the new-leafed 
trees birds sing the hours away. It is a home 
of flowers, where blind girls wander in angel 
innocence, now twining garlands in their hair, 
now bowing their heads to smell and kiss the 
blossoms, they may not pluck ; and with 
thankful lips they speak of him who placed 
them there. 

The sun has veiled his splendors behind the 
hills, save here and there a truant beam lin- 
gering, as if reluctant to quit the world, till 
my poor eyes have seen their light. School 
duties are over, all are abroad, each to his fa- 
vorite diversion. Eddy, the blind Pole, (better 
known as the blind prodigy,) is at the organ. 
Haydn's Creation is now a creation of his own. 



86 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

The spirit of its author is on him ; he is the 
personation of genius ; the sightless spirit of 
lovely sounds. Here comes my little friend 
Cynthia, the blind poetess, to tend her plants. 
Whispers are on her lips Ioav and sweet as an- 
gel lutes ; her thoughts go in rhymes. A copy 
of her Poems has lately been published, a 
thank-offering to her friends, which like her- 
self, every where meets a warm reception. 

Now the air all around rings with the 
school-girl's merry laugh — the old servant who 
has been in the Institution since it was found- 
ed, from years and respect has long had the 

title of Mr. , is with them at the swing. 

"Ride fareless, my pretty craturs," says he, 
" and if the swang comes down, I'll be aftei 
catchmg your swate souls, all in my arms, to 
be sure." 

A school like this is a world by itself, the 
manners and customs of which are as unlike 
the real world as possible. A few evenings 
since, I chanced to be in the little girls' sitting- 
room; the subject of theh innocent conversa- 
tion, then happened to be, the birds. " The 
Canary is the sweetest singer in the world," 



LIZZY S FAVORITE BIRD. 87 

says Cassy. " That may be/' says Lizzy, " but 
Its feathers are not half so soft and pretty as 
the grasshopper's." " Psha," says one more 
experienced, " the grasshopper is not a bn-d." 
** It is," says Lizzy ; " I have felt them fly 
against my head, many a time, though my 
little hands could never catch one ; and sister 
Mary used to say they were a beautiful green, 
and she wished I could see them." 

Another time little Matta says to Angy, " Do 
you know that, when you speak a lie, the 
guilty feeling comes out all over your face, so 
that those who see you know that you are 
telling a story ?" " No," says Angy, •' I do not 
think it, though I have heard mamma say 
to little brother. You are guilty, I can see 
it in your eyes ; and you know my eyes are 
closed, and she never said so to me." " Well, 
it is so," says Matta, " and that is the way 
God sees our hearts, and knows all we are 
thinking." 

The past and the present are as the two 
sides to a pane of glass — we cannot see the one, 
vnthout seeing the other; now, I remember 
the morning when Mr. Loder left me here. 



88 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

In Rochester I was always surrounded by th^ 
best of friends, by whom my every wish was 
anticipated ; but here it was not so, and moro 
than ever I felt that 1 was blind and in the 
world alone. Two long days wore away — 
then came the Sabbath — and a Sabbath in a 
strange land is a lonely day indeed ; during 
the morning service, I heard nothing. My 
thoughts were far away over the current of 
years — my soul turned back upon itself, and 
in my heart I said ; " to die is nothing, but to 
live and not see, is misfortune." When all 
had left the Chapel but myself, I began gro])- 
ing my way back to the parlor. There all 
were social and happy, as mortals may be, 
but my heart was too full for words or tears. 

Presently a tread was heard inside the door , 
"Oh! Ml. Dean, Mr. Dean," exclaimed every 
voice, " have you come ? we are glad to see 
you. Have you brought a book? what is it? 
and how long will you read to us ?" Mr. 
Dean is one of the Managers, and a kind 
father to us all ; and though a man of busi- 
ness and his residence in town, yet he finds 
tune to visit us every day, and the interviews 



THE DESERT AND THE FLOWEU. 89 

are to us all lights in a dark place. In a few 
days lie bronght his daughter to see me, to 
whose kindness I owe much happiness. Her 
friendship has been to me what Mungo Park's 
flower was to him in the Desert. 

After seven months' confinement to the wa.is 
of an Institution, can you imagine with what 
transport I received through her an invitation 
to pass a little time in the family of Mrs. 
Allen, of Newark, New Jersey, the city of 
Elms. Her home is " seated soft among the 
trees." Mrs. A. has seen many years ; her 
heart is the home of pious emotions, and to 
know her is to love her. 

Not long since, through the kindness of Mr. 
Townscnd, of this city, I had the pleasure of 
hearing Dr. Dewey, who has lately returned 
from Washington. I had heard the remark 
that he was not so eloquent in the pulpit as 
with his pen ; that, like Goldsmith, he could 
reason best when alone ; but a more eloquent 
and heart-healing discourse I have seldom 
heard. In consequence of declining health, 
he is about closing his ministerial labors and 
works of love ; but he will leave with his peo- 



90 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

pie a name set round with good deeds, like a 
diadem of honor. * « « ♦ • 



Institution for ihe Blind. 

My ever dear Eliza: — I planted you in 
my heart long ago ; it was then a garden plot, 
fresh and green, and full of blossoms. But 
now, how changed ! Mildew and death are 
there, and frosts cold and frigid have turned 
its leaves, and sleety winds have shaken them 
to the ground. And yet, dearest, you stand 
now as then, firm and beautiful. Like the 
oak, you have spread your branches, and I 
in my weariness come to repose in their shade. 

Eliza, many times the moon has "'vaned 
since I wrote to you ; but loving as her beams 
on the hills, are my memories of the Seneca, 
and those who dwell by its shore. I have 
been ill. Health is indeed a precious gift, 
without it we can hardly be happy within our- 
selves, or useful to those around us. Suffering 
the will of God, and doing it, are very unlike ; 
but in every condition wo have something to 



WATCHFUL SPIRITS. 91 

be grateful for. Indeed, I doubt, if we are 
ever so placed that we have not more smiles 
for the day, than tears for the night, and more 
cause for joy than mourning. Watchful spirits 
are at every post. Angels with folded pinions 
are in every path, indeed the world is full of 
them. Our feet never stumble, want never 
approaches, and ills of any kind are seldom 
long in the way, but some Samaritan hand 
lifts us out of them. No night is so dark that 
our Father's smile cannot dheer it, and no 
place IS so barren, so far removed, that his 
blessings and mercies cannot reach it. And 
how lich and bountiful they come. New 
every morning, fresh every evening, and re- 
peated every moment of our lives. 

It is November. The frost has bitten the 
forest leaves, and the trees are robed in 
Autumn's bleeding hues. The day-god is in 
the sky, gladdening all the world, but oh, he 
sheds no light for me. Nothing strikes the 
chord af responsive memories like music. Eliza, 
this morning the Band are in the chapel, play- 
ing Love Not, and the variations ; and with- 
out the winds are blowing a sort of trumpet 



92 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

accompaniment ; now, the tide of their rich 
harmony ebbs and flows along the borders oi 
my soul, kindling my thoughts, and making 
my pulses beat quicker. Now they are scat- 
tering Mozart's Requiem on the air. Oh, 
Heaven be always thanked for an atmospliere 
that may be formed into sweet sounds. Looks 
of love are bright things, but words are far 
more dear. The former play upon the aeart 
like moonbeams upon the waters, but tlie lat- 
ter sink down into it, thence coming forth in 
blossoms and clustering fruits, like seeds lost 
in the earth. No wonder the deaf Beethoven 
by gesturing words exclaimed, " all the plea- 
sures of sight and sense, all my eyes ever 
saw, would I give for one whisper to my 
heart." 



Rochester. Oct., 1846. 

Dear Clara: — 'Tis~ Autumn, and to-day 
the winds howl mournfully among the trees. 
Four long weeks I have been pillowed on a 
«ick couchj and though with much of its dra- 



A DREAM. 93 

pery around me, I can to-day sit in an easy 
chair. Fever still burns on my cheeks, and 
my brow is pressed with throbbing pain. Last 
night they fed me opium, and I slept a plea- 
sant sleep. I dreamed of other days. I 
thought that we again, arm in arm, paced the 
halls of the old seminary, and talked confid- 
ingly of bright realities in the future. The 
chime of the welcome school-bell again rang 
in my ears, and I heard the halls echo with 
the familiar tread of many feet, and mingling 
voices, all buoyant with hope and love. 

This morning I engaged a friend to write 
for me, while I fancy myself whispering in 
your ear the story of all that grieves me, and 
wrings every joy from my heart. " Truth is 
often stranger than fiction," and the tale I shall 
tell you needs no coloring. Clara, I am blind! 
for ever shrouded in the thick darkness of an 
endless night. And now, when I look down 
the current of coming years, a heavy gloom 
settles on me, almost to suffocation. Is there 
any sympathy in your heart? Oh then weep 
with me, for now, like an obstinate prisoner, I 
feel my spirit struggling to be free. But oh, 



94 A PLACE m THY MEMORY. 

'tis all in vain, 'tis all over, misery's self seems 
stopping my breath, hope is dead, and my 
heart sinks within me. Clara, I am in a land 
of strangers too. Stranger voices somid in my 
ears, and stranger hands smooth my brow, 
and administer to my wants. 1 see them not, 
but I know they have learned the laws ot 
kindness. I love them, and pray Heaven to 
hold them in remembrance. 

But let me change the subject. The first 
year after we parted at school, my love of 
knowledge increased every day. I continued 
Italian with a success that pleased me. I 
read various French authors, besides trans- 
lating most of the Old Testament Scriptures, 
reviewed RoUin, &c. 

In June last. Dr. De Kroyft was seized with 
hemorrhage of the lungs. He sent for me and 
I came to him. Every day his lips grew 
whiter, and ihe deep paleness on his brow 
alarmed me. Now, in a half-coughing tone, 1 
hear him say, Helen, I fear the hand of con- 
sumption is settling on me, and my days will 
soon be numbered. On the afternoon of the 
Fourth he visited me, went out, and returned 



I SAW HIM DIE. 



95 



no more. Our wedding-day came. It was 
his wish, and by his bedside our marriage 
was confirmed. Soon after I saw him die. 
They laid him in the ground, and I heard the 
fresh dirt rattle on his narrow home, and felt 
as if my hold on life had left me. I lingered 

in R a little time longer. How J got 

through the days I do not know. William's 
room, his books, and the garden where I wept, 
are all I remember, until I awoke one morning 
and my eyes were swollen tight together. I 
could no more move them, or lift up the lids, 
than roll the mountains from their places. 
They were swollen with an inflammation that 
three days after made me for ever blind — oh, 
the word! Like the thunders of Niagara it 
was more than I could hear. Thus, dear Clara, 
in simplicity, I have told you all. No, not the 
half. Words can never reach the feelings that 
swell my heart, imagination can never paint 
them. They are known only to me. Sorrow, 
melancholy, blighted hopes, wounded love^ 
grief and despair, clad in hues of darkness, all 
brood upon my silent heart, and bitter fear is 
in all my thoughts. Oh, what will become of 



96 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY 

me? Is there benevolence in this world? Must 
charity supply my wants? Will there be al- 
ways some hand to lead me? Have the blind 
ever a home in any heart? Does any thing 
ever cheer them? Are their lives always use- 
less? Is there any thing they can do? So I 
question, and wonder, until with morphine 
they quiet my distracted thoughts. When my 
eyes were swelling as if they would quit their 
sockets, and my entire being was racked with 
pain, forgive me, Clara, I did question if there 
be a God in heaven who is always merciful. 
But to-day, in the calmness of better feelings, 
my confidence is unmoved, and " though he 
slay me, yet will I trust in him." Though I 
do not feel all the self-abnegation of Fenelon. 
yet I am certain my heavenly Father loves 
me, and will grant me ever his protecting care 
and sustaining grace. Adieu, but think of me, 
and pray for me sometimes. 

P. S. Dear Clara:— This is the first letter J 
lave prompted to any one, and is it possible 
that I am never again to write with my own 
hand, or read the letters of my friends when 
they come? Oh God! save me, lest I mur- 



BEAUTIFUL, THOUGH FALLEN. Q"? 

mill. You must write my dear mother, (^lara, 
and comfort her, for I cannot. * * * * « 



IriLtiLuiion for the Blind. 

Dear Eliza : — To-morrow you will leave 
school, you say, to return " never more." Sol- 
emn words. When our lovely parent Eve 
made her last round of delight in her garden 
home, played gently with her sportive fawns, 
pressed kisses on her flowers, and lingered by 
Eden's meandering streams, whose murmurs 
seemed a lower strain, blending sweetly v^rith 
the songs of her caressing birds, she smiled 
sadly on all she loved, and passing hurriedly 
the closing gate, the words of the protecting 
Angel fell on her ear — "Never more !" "never 
more !" They went on, Adam and Eve, 
beautiful though fallen ; thorns grew up in 
their paths, but memory, ever wont to dwell on 
what is pleasing, often reverted to lovely 
Eden, its laughing brooks and fountains, where 
seraplis had been their familiar guessts; but 



98 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Eve could only sigh " never more '/"' The winds 
and the zephyrs caught the melancholy air, 
and to the farthest verge of time echo's last re- 
sponse will be — " Never more," " never more.'' 
When first the fountain of a mother's feelings 
was stirred, looking despairingly on the form 
of lier child, cold in death, the Angels beheld 
what till then they had never seen, a spirit or 
mortal weeping for that which may return, 
never more. Tears are the language of feel- 
in^^, the dews that water love, and keep it 
alive when its leaves would wither. 

Eliza, believe m.e, it is better that you learn 
early what hardships are, and how to meet 
life's many ills. Begin now to share another's 
woe, and help to bear the burden under which 
thy neighbor may be sinking. Check often 
thy mirth and go to the house of mourning, 
and school thy buoyant voice to speak sooth- 
ingly to the distressed. Life is not a dream. 
Young or old, we have always something to 
do, and something to bear. Our work too is 
liere, and the voice of beseeching suffering 
calls us to it, and the cry of love and philan- 
thropy is, " Come over and help us.^' Fields 



HAVE YOU NOTHING TO DO? 99 

of usefulness are as many as the doors which 
enter the abodes of the poor. And have you 
nothing to do 1 Shall your hands be busy only 
to adorn your frail body and twine garlands 
of flowers ? Have you no energies of heart and 
mind to spend in the great work of self-cul- 
ture, and the amelioration of mankind ? The 
terms you have passed at school, have enrich- 
ed your heart with enlightened feelings, and 
stored your mind with new and aspiring 
thoughts ; you have received new impulses to 
your progressive nature, and enlargement of 
your mental and moral capacities, for which 
you are answerable, and will be held respon- 
sible to the great Father of mankind. The 
philanthropic Howard, speaking of a young 
friend, said, " She taught me to forget myself 
and live for my neighbor." Her morning and 
evening visits to the poor were simple in them- 
selves, but in their effects you see they were 
boundless and lasting as eternity. When 
Henry Martin's sister hung affectionately about 
^is neck, entreating him with all the earnest- 
ness of tears to remain with her, he replied : 
"Sister, the Saviour you taught me to love 



100 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

has a work for me in a heathen land, and 1 
shall go to it, trusting your prayers and His 
love will sustain me there." Such homebound 
efforts and examples are swelling springs in the 
hillside, whence flow multiplying arid fertil- 
izing streams, whose healthful influences are 
felt throughout the world. They are seeds 
planted here to blossom in a higher, holier 
life. Now while you are lingering on ground 
so hallowed, so sacred to the heart and mem- 
ory of both teacher and scholar, would that 
some heaven-born resolve, worthy the place 
and the hour, might find a lodgment in your 
thoughts, and a resting place in your heart. 
It is the misfortune of some to be ever vacil- 
lating between good purposes and their non- 
performance. If you would be truly useful, 
continued and persevering action must mark 
your every course. Take unto thyself then a 
standard of what is right, and make all else 
yield thereunto. Then, what though thy 
smiles fade and tears come in their stead, and 
the world frown darkly on thee, if so there be 
no clouds between thee and thy God ? 



LEARNING MUSIC. 101 



Brooklyn^ Anniversary Week. 
Friend Carry : — The last six months I 
have drummed a piano at the rate of seven 
hom's per day. And now, when I see how 
httle I have acquired that is really useful, I am 
ready to exclaim with Mrs. Hopkins' cook, " Oh ! 
what an inglorious way of spending one's time !" 
Music is indeed a science of difficult attain- 
ment, and in order to excel, even the most 
gifted must commence it in early life. For 
however well one may understand the theory, 

manual skill is wanting. 

***** 

The British bard was not far from right 
when he said " in life there is no present ;" for 
certainly a moment is no sooner here, than it 
is gone, and we find ourselves either drawing 
from the past, or robbing an imagined future. 
Remind you, dear, of mornings in the old sem- 
inary, when your room-mate, Helen, returned 
from a recitation, and in girlish glee tossed her 
books upon the table, and perchance shook you 
unti' the tasteful braids of your hair tumbled 



102 A PLACE IN THY MEMOltY. 

dowiij and then, to make all well, kissed youi 
lips, and promised never to do the like again. 
Carry, as I loved you then, I love you now. 
Care has left some traces upon my brow, bui 
really the order of my feelings is but little 
changed. Perhaps I am wrong, but I always 
allow myself to think the fault is in the place 
mstead of my eyes, and persuade myself I 
should see well enough if the blinds were only 
thrown open, or the lights brought in. But it 
is not so ; the windows of my soul are surely 
darkened, and no light is there, save the un- 
borrowed lustre of its own jewels, and the 
mingled rays of those spirit stars, love and 
hope, which never set. Cheered by their light, 
Milton wove his celestial strains, Gough pur- 
sued his botany, culled his flowers, and ar- 
ranged his plants ; the Swiss Huber tended his 
bees, Buret chiselled marble, and Giovanni 
Gonelli moulded clay into forms that to their 
gentle touch seemed warming into life. 

I wonder if St. Paul was blind. I believe 
Hannah More in her beautiful essay upon him, 
thmks he was. If so, he must have managed 
to write better than I do, or there was no need 



BROOKLYN FEMALE ACADEMY. 103 

of his explaining to the Corinthians, that he 
had saluted them with his own hand. 

Mr. Crittenden has removed from Albany, 
and presides in the Brooklyn Female Academy 
Yesterday I attended his anniversary exami- 
nation. I thought the recitations more syste- 
matic and thorough than any I have e\ex 
heard from classes composed only of ladies. 

Besides, I like Mr. C.'s mode of examining ; 
he only names the subject, without any assisting 
interrogatories. The pupil is then required to 
follow closely the reasonings of the author, 
giving his ideas in her own words. 

The recitations were mostly heard in the 
library, and during the interim of classes Miss 
Emily gave me its etceteras. In the middle 
of the floor is a large case of birds, gracefully 
perched, but voiceless as they are lifsless. The 
books are new, and mostly from modern and 
select authors. The cabinets are quite large, 
but the chemical and philosophical apparatus 
is yet in its infancy, though they say it is 
growing fast. The picture gallery is an upper 
room, lighted from the sky. The walls are 
covered with pencillings and paintings of the 



104 A PLACE IN THY M£MOR¥. 

young ladies. It is customary for each to leave 
there a piece of her work. There is something 
in this idea exceedingly pleasing to me. There 
stood their easels with half-finished paintings 
on them ; " ekes of men and women,'' as Kirke 
White says ; and half-drawn rivers, and out- 
lined ruins of cities and castles. Last evening 
we heard Strakosch again, the celebrated pia- 
nist to the Emperor Nicholas. I wish 3^ou 
could once hear his fingers dance through the 
mazes of sound, almost up to the highest note 
in all nature, which Professor Whitlock says is 
the noise the musquito makes when he beats 
the air with his wings ; then down to the low 
flutter of the miller, and the far-otf droppings 
of falling water. His style is so fascinating, 
dear me ! if all the Emperor's subjects are like 
him, I envy him his reign. Why it would be 
like sitting upon the summit of delight, v/ith 
harping fairies at one's feet. Have you read M:*. 
Jacob Abbot's "Crowned Heads of Europe?' 
Not long since I passed a day in his school 
Being near the close of the term, the young 
ladies were exchanging parting gifts. One re- 
seivcd a Chinese work-box, and gave in return 



I WISH THEY WERE BETTER. 105 

a beautiful guitar, and a volume of Jenny 
Lind's songs, — paintnigs, books, boxes, card- 
cases, bracelets, rings, daguerreotypes, ifcc, 
iverc among their tokens of school-day love. 
About the whole establishment there seemed 
an air of wealth and refinement. Mr. Abbot 
was exceedingly affable ; he spoke very freely 
of his travels, books, &c. When some reference 
was had to the great excellence of his produc- 
tions, he very modestly replied, " I only wish 
they were better." Carry, I purposed writing 
you only a little note, but really I have 
made quite a letter of it, if indeed the stringing 
together of disjointed sentences can in any case 
make a letter. 



Friend Phin: — Not more welcome could 
be the appearance of an Inn to a weary tra- 
veller, than was your kind letter to me. It 
came when it so happened that most of our 
seeing people were absent, and with it in hand, 
I ran many times from first to third story, 
dodging in at every door, in pursuit of a pair 
5* 



106 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

of eyes. At length an old servant, by aid oi 
his glasses, spelled out the name upon the 
margin, and my curiosity thus much relic ved, 
I went on with my practising. We have no 
such thing here as music with raised notes. 
We are all taught orally, and play from me- 
mory, the same as I would have learned music 
elsewhere, only perhaps more scientifically. I 
find the blind folks here a singular sort of 
people indeed. Their habits, manners, and 
ideas of things are so unlike the world, that 
" I am to them all a foreigner," as the Paddy 
said of the French. * * * * Now Phin, 
you are not far from right when you call this 
Institution a nunnery, for it is certainly a place 
where ladies retire from the world, and never 
more see the face of man. Some are here for 
life; others for a specified time. AVe have 
nine pianos in the Institution, and some eighty 
who practise upon them, which affords only 
one hour each per day. We have also two 
organs, besides violins, flutes, and a large brass 
band. All these going, I quite forget I am 
inclosed with iron doors, and granite walls, 
and seem the inhabitant of a spirit land, where 



THERE I BREATHED LOVES VO\A . 107 

harmony reigns, anthems are ever new, and 
" ever throbs with melody the air." 

I wish you would come over some time, and 
take a run with us around the gymnastic pole, 
a walk on the promenade grounds, or a swing 
m what they call the scupp. I pass an hour 
every morning in the upper piazza, on the side 
of the building that looks away towards Ro- 
chester. Oh truly, the fail est land is where 
our friends abide. Rochester has been to me 
an eventful place. There my eyes fiyst opened 
to this beautiful Vv^orld, and there they closed 
upon its glories for ever. There I learned to 
love, and there I breathed love's vows; there 
I saw the guardian angel break the idol of my 
affections; there, in the night-time of sorrow 
and care, strangers took me up, and blessed 
me, and loved me too. Oh chide me not then, 
if, more than all the world beside, I love the 
warm hearts of Rochester. 



108 A PLACE fN THY MEMORY 



Stone Collage, 
The stars are bright on the brook by the 
dcor, as if they had ahghted there, awhile to 
bathe and watch their shadows in the sky 
whence they came. Night, oh lovely night; 
in thy peaceful hours the heart is ever wont 
to go abroad in search of those it holds most 
dear. The last hour, Nin has been reading me 
" The Lays of Many Hours," by Miss Maylin, 
of Salem, New Jersey, a cousin of the distin- 
guished Dr. Bo wring, of England: there is a 
beautiful ease in the tread of her fancies, which 
reminds me of Mrs. Embury. 

Yesterday we finished " The Neighbors,'- 
and in the evening paper saw a notice, that 
its fair authoress is on her way to our country. 
I wonder who will go out to meet her. Cer- 
tainly, the ladies of our land should do some- 
thing to signalize their gratitude and esteem 
for one of their sisters, from whom they have 
received so many lessons of literary and do- 
mestic instruction. # * * * 
Nine summers ago, in a neat school-room, a 



COUSIN WILL. 109 

little way down the hill from my uncle'Sj 1 
played the school-mistress. One day, a black- 
eyed, curly-headed little boy, with a green sat- 
chel on his arm and a straw hat in his hand, 
walked into the room and accosted me so 
handsomely, that I was straightway in love 
with him; and when I asked his name, he 
replied promptly, "Master William Lovejoy, 
Ma'am ; my father and mother are travelling 
this summer, and if you please, they have sent 
me to attend your school." "Ah!" said I, 
we are indeed very happy to welcome you one 
of our httle number." Then by way of atten- 
tion, I gave him a conspicuous seat, hung up 
his hat, then opened his satchel and looked 
over his books, smoothed down his curls, and 
patted his rasy cheeks, until the nev7-comer 
seemed to feel himself quite at home ; then 1 
went on again hearing my little ones read 
their a, b, c, and spell out their b 1 a, bla ! But 
ever and anon my eyes wandered to little 
William's seat; and as often met his^ glancing 
Dver his shoulder, peeping quizzingly into the 
:ace of one, and exchanging knowing looks 
vith another, and when he saw me observing 



llO A PLACE IN IMY MEftlORY. 

him; half laughed, and looked on his book 
again. 

I soon learned that his mother was a dis- 
tant relative of my aunt, which served not a 
little to increase the interest I already felt in 
my ^aew pupil. However, the summer wore 
away, the school closed, William's parents re- 
turned and took him to their home. Another 
summer passed, and my dear aunt die'd. I 
saw them lay her in the grave ; and shortly af- 
ter William's mother came to me, saying, 
" Evermore I will be your aunt, and my home 
shall be your home." And his father added, 
" Yes ; and if she will be a good girl, she may 
have me for her uncle ;" " and me for Cousin 
Will," shouted a sweet voice, and with his arms 
around my neck, half said and half kissed 
Cousin Helen, on my tearful cheek. 

A few years after, when these rayless shades 
had but lately gathered about me, a letter from 
Cousin Will first broke my melancholy. — 
" Come to us," said he ; " we think of you all 
the time. Come, do come soon ; bring all your 
books and every thing. Mother and I have 
made all tJ.'.e plans for the winter — what we 



SCHOOL-DAY RELICS. Ill 

shall read, and where we shall go, and so 
on. Your pet table has been in my room this 
summer, and that old chair with tlie squeak- 
ing back you loved so well ; but they are all 
replaced now, and it looks there again as if my 
dear coz. had but just stepped out." * * * 
Friday, you know, was our National Fast 
Day. I took no supper the previous evening, 
nor breakfast the next morning ; attended 
church at St. Luke's ; heard Marion play. 
During the service I took it into my head and 
heart to be lonely, and on my way home said 
to sister, " Come, let us go and see what time 
the stage leaves for F." In spite of her re- 
monstrances we did so, and at three I took a 
seat for a ride of twelve miles, over to the home 
of my black-eyed, curly-headed Cousin Will. 
There all my books and papers were, and all 
my letters since I first began to write, and all 
the little relics of my school-days, which Cousin 
Will read for me, and I tore them in pieces and 
burned them. Not a scrap have I left which 
has my handwriting on it, save a httle French 
song which I copied a long time ago. That T 
preserved for you, and a drawing of a little 



112 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

tired deer crawled among the brambles to 
die. In my Bible I found a book-mark whicn 
I send you, for my hands will do those things 
no more. 

Many days Cousin Will and I have wan- 
dered together in the woods, and under the old 
elm tree, a little back of the house, read poetry 
hours together, until his speaking eyes saw 
beauty in every thing. Now, we wandered 
over the same grounds, he guiding me, where 
long ago I led him. ***** 



Long Island, Water Cure, Aug. 30, 1848. 

It was a chance breeze that blew us to- 
gether, and Monday morning the same bore 
us apart. We met as strangers always meet, 
but our spirits came very soon to know each 
other ; we talked freely, you were very kind, 
and I of course liked you for that. Next I 
learned to esteem you, for I thought you just 
and good. I fancied a native love of right, 
mterwoven with every lineament of youi 



A NEW FRIEND. 113 

noble features, and expressed in every air oi 
your manly bearing. In short, from our little 
acquaintance, I have gathered the impression 
that you are a generous, high-souled nature, 
tnat you had rather lay down your life than 
condescend to a wrong act. I prize your 
friendship, and evermore, if it be your pleasure, 
I will count you in the list of my correspond- 
ing friends. Let the world frown ever so 
darkly, or prosperity smile ever so charmingly, 
it will be all the same ; in my confidence and 
simple affections there will ever be a place for 
you ; and as you said in your good-by to Mrs. 

H , " once in a very long time think just a 

little of me," so I will say to you. Think of 
me only when you can get no subject of 
thought more engaging, or find feelings to 
share more congenial. Could you have look- 
ed back on us the day after you left, and 
beheld what a gap your departure made in 
our circle, I think you would have acknow- 
ledged yourself complimented, if not a little 
flattered. Every time the ladies met they 
regretted your departure, but the gentleman 
sat round in the piazza grinning, as if they 



114 A PLACE IX THY MEMORY, 

were glad of it. That little Swede has so 
stepped into the good graces of the young 
ladies, that they have nearly adopted him 
Bean General, in your place. He has told me 
many little incidents of his history which 
interest me much. Since he has been m our 
countiy, he has supported his aged father by 
his hard earnings, the poor man meantime 
supposing his son amassing a fortune in the 
New World. He knew the Bremers, and his 
accounts of them are very pleasing. 

Dr. R plays matron this week, and 

tlie patients dD nothing but brag of their fare, 
and say no more about going away. We 
have such excellent bread and delicious grid- 
dle-cakes ; and such magnificent mush, so 
coarse ground, the kernels must have been 
cracked three into one. You write very 
enticingly of the City, but you have no sea 
breeze there, no hills to gaze upon, no Sound, 
no beautiful bay and woods Avith sleeping 
lakes among ; no brooks where to wander, or 
hills to climb. 

I received a note from my good friend Mr. 
I) J to-day, from which I infer he has noi 



BE WISE BE GOOD. 115 

received mine by you. Plecise get it to him 
as soon as convenient. Kind regards to your 
fun-making brother. May he always be 
merry as now — oh no, I will take that back. 
Reverses and disappointments make us con- 
siderate. We are here to be prepared for 
another life, and the course best for us our 
Heavenly Father will mark out, and thither 
our footsteps must fall. Be wise, be good, be 
truthful to thyself, and fear God, that thou 
mayest be happy here, and numbered with the 
blest hereafter. 

P. S. The long road you taught us over the 
hill, Kate and I walk three times every day ; 
often stopping on the brow of it, to roll the 
stones far below. Then we trudge on, talking 
sometimes delightedly and sometimes sadly. 
Do not indulge too freely in those good things, 
or you will have to return here, where you 
know self-denial is not only a virtue but part 
of the treatment. 

Yesterday a party of us sailed up the Sound, 
and passed an hour in the house where 
General Washington, soon after the war, in 
his tour of Long Island, stopped over night 



116 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

with his friend Daniel Young. A son of the 
same gentleman resides there still, but his 
head is covered with the "garniture of the 
grave," and like the roof that shelters him, he 
must soon fall to the earth. 



Long Island Water Cure, Aug. 1848. 

My Good Friend Mr. D. : — I have waited 
these many days hoping to find a nand long 
enough above water to write you. The sail in 
company with your excellent friend, Vice 
Chancellor McC. and Mrs. N., (to whom he 
introduced me soon after you left,) was delight- 
ful indeed. The briny air of the Sound was 
free and bracing, and over those peaches our 
chat was more like the meeting of familiar 
friends, than the growing converse of stran- 
gers. 

Dr. S. met me at the landing, as you and he 
had arranged, and his cordial reception quite 
banished all my fears. It was the same at the 
house; indeed they all seemed to know me, and 



WATER-CURE PATIENTS. 117 

as they gathered round, one after another, foi 
hitroductions, I verily thought myself breath- 
ing anew atmosphere, and shaking hands with 
the people from a climate at least forty degrees 
warmer than Institution latitude. Pardon my 
detail, but I wish to tell you as much, as pos- 
sible of the kindness of Dr. S. He seated me 
at table next himself, directly opposite Mrs. N., 
and every attention possible has so far been 
paid me. 

We have a very pleasant company of ladies. 
The gentlemen are representatives of almost 
every nation, all however very affable and en- 
tertaining. An English officer, who was 
wounded while engaged in the Queen's ser- 
vice in India, seems a sort of walking Ency- 
clopedia, a perfect embodiment of general in- 
telligence ; this, united with an eloquent voice, 
makes him quite the intellectual star of our 
circle, and as we are allowed no time for read- 
ing, it is fortunate to have such an inexhausti- 
ble fund to draw from. There is a gentleman 
here too from St. Petersburgh, whose father 
was a' Russian general, his mother a Polish 
lady, and when the country of the latter struck 



118 A PLACK 1\ THY MEMORY. 

for freedom, the son "bared his breast" for the 
land of his mother, and of course can return 
to his home no more. He is gallant as a 
kniglit. and affable as a Frenchman, and more 
kind and attentive to the wants of all, than 
any one here. 

Knowing this to be the resort of invalids I 
expected to find all very quiet and sad, but a 
more merry group I never met. Here, to get 
well, the patients have a round of duties to 
perform, each tasked according to his ability. 
Indeed exercise is an important part of the 
treatment. When I arrived, some were play- 
ing ball, others were returning from long 
walks ; some singing, playing the piano, organ, 
guitar, violin, and so on. We have one sub- 
ject of conversation which never wears out, 
that is, diet. diet. They say it is the same at 
all establishments of this kind ; the treatment 
makes people hungry; and besides, we are 
obliged to live plainly, and one meal is no 
sooner over, than little groups in the piazza 
and all around are talking about what they 
will have to eat the next time. Some- have 



SHROTES HUNGER CURE. 119 

their food weighed to them. Eight ounces of 
coarse bread, or its equivalent, is, I beheve, all 
that many are allowed. 

Dr. S. is at present giving us a course of lec- 
tures upon Shrotes' theory of the Hunger 
Cure. This is indeed the stranarest thins: I 
have heard yet, starving a man to make him 
well, Shrotes' establishment is a little way 
up the mountain beyond Priessnitz. Dr. S. 
says he actually saw and conversed with a 
man there, who had not tasted food nor water 
for seven days, save what his body drank in 
from the surface, as he was every day several 
hours rolled in damp sheets. 

Dr. N., President of Union College, is here, 
receiving treatment for inflammatory rheuma- 
tism. When he came he was moved only in 
his arm-chair, which has a wheel on each side, 
and so constructed that he rolls it himself by 
means of two levers. This morning he walked 
a little way on the piazza alone, and oh ! how 
delighted he was, but he is yet a very great suf- 
ferer. A friend in New- York sends him every 
morning a basket of choice fruit, from which ] 



120 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

am often favored. Mrs. N. has promised me a 
ride in their Httle three-wheeled carriage, 3 
kind of vehicle that I never saw. 

My health is certa inly improving ; cold watei 
or something else has so shocked my nervous 
energies into life, that I can already Avalk 
several miles in a day. The treatment is not 
so disagreeable as I feared, and on the whole 
I am passing my time very pleasantly. In- 
deed I am entering into the full spirit of the 
water cure, and its every variety of bath. 
However, Mr. D., I shall heed your caution to 
examine every day my fingers and toes, and 
when I see them showing any signs of being 
connected by those thin membraneous sub- 
stances, known to naturalists as wehs^ I will 
most assuredly, as you say, ask the doctor for 
his bill, and hurry home ; for I have no idea 
of joining any of the finny tribes, whatever 
else may become of me. I can hardly think 
it possible that you wrote your last in an at- 
mosphere heated to 92° Fahrenheit. Indeed 
if Hamlet had been with you, he might have 
realized personally his prayer — 



THE YOUNG BARON. 121 

•* Oh that this too, too solid flesh would m«lt. 
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew." 

You say, if Hydropathy. Allopathy and Ho 
moepathy fail, there is still left Chrono-Ther^ 
tnal treatment. I do not know what that is, 
but fancy I should prefer Shrotes' fasting plan 
as my " dernier resort^ 



New- York Institution for the Blind, 
March 22nd, 1849. 

When I heard of the cholera in New Or- 
leans, I easily imagined the sad dilemma you 
were in. I saw you in the lonely hotel tread- 
ing the floor, then stopping short, lost in trou- 
bled thought. I saw too the shadow of gloom 
that settled on your brow, and though far 
away, be assured I shared your fears, for I 
knew it was not for yourself you were suffer- 
ing. Is it not possible that we have misnamed 
a part of oui Heavenly Father's dispensations, 
for coming as they do, all from the same hand, 
why are they not all good? I wish I could 
say something this morning that would divest 
6 



122 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

you of every care, and banish every sliade 
from your thoughts. But the bravest and best 
have been those whose pilgrim feet were of- 
tenest torn. ***** 

Across the way are some Germans, among 
them a young Baron who is sorely distressed, 
and my heart aches for him. Though Imt 
nineteen years old he has passed the ordeal of 
the Mexican war, and is now suffering its 
painful consequences. God pity the youth 
whose inexperienced feet have wandered so 
far from his home, where he has no one to 
speak an encouraging word or lead him again 
in the right way. His brother is one of the 
principal actors in the present revolutions of 
Germany, and his poor mother writes that her 
pillow is never dry from her tears for her lost 
son. 

When Julian was here last we went to see 
him. What a good creature Julian is; ho 
seems to me the very personation of truthful- 
ness and benevolence. I wish you could have 
heard his encouraging advice to that young 
Baron. Beside being unsophisticated and un- 
assuming, he is nobly generous, frank, and 



Lrr: 



MY LITTLE HOME. 123 

Straightforward as a sunbeam; united with 
the artless innocence of youth, he possesses 
the stirring energies of a man, and that un- 
compromising integrity which characterizes all 
his ways, must secure him success in any un- 
dertaking. He seems very much pleased with 
that little Miss A., but says he is not in a posi- 
tion to marry, so you see he is discreet withal. 
Sometimes he brings up his guitar, and really 
he plays and sings with a great deal of taste. 

Well, it has at last come to this : they say I 
must get my home by making a book, and ad- 
vise me to publish a little volume of my letters. 
Mr. C. and Mr. D. say they will help me all 
they can, and I am half a mind to undertake 
it. Do not say one discouraging word, for I 
have already too many fears to insure success. 
But never mind ; I shall yet by some means 
have that little cottage, little parlor, little 
icitchen, and little cook, little carriage, little 
pony, little driver, and all that sort of thing. 
My amanuensis is laughing, — I suppose she is 
thinking what gay times you will all have 
when you come to see me, and Mr. M. too, 



124 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

with his wife and fortune. Mr. B. better hurry 
up, for Mp. M. does not bring so many oranges 
here for nothing ; besides, you know S. is very 
susceptible of the tender emotion. I hope nei- 
ther of them will trifle with her feelings, for 
with her such an injury would be irreparable, 
as she is so inexperienced in such matters. 

I have just two things more to write you : 
first, I anticipate your visit to New- York, 
second, I hope it will be soon, and for the sake 
of euphony I will add a third ; there is no 
good in this life that I do not pray may be 
yours. I have always told you more pros- 
perous days will come ; and I feel now that 
their dawning has begun. Put on your feet 
the sandals of sincerity, fastened with the 
buckles of integrity; bind about your heart 
the noble principles of Christianity ; in a word, 
take up yourself just as you are, and go forth. 
If barriers are in the way, wait not to remove 
them, but, like the heroes of old, boldly tread 
them down ; and when the sun has crossed 
the sky a few more times, you will be in pos- 
session of what you so much desire. 

You say my friend Sarah is beautiful ; more 



OLD CLAIMS REGARDED. 125 

than that, she is good. I have never known 
a young lady across whose mind the shadow 
of change so seldom falls. As you see her 
first, so she is ever after, joyous, kind and af- 
fectionate ; Mrs. S., her aunt, is a very model 
of female excellence; and her son Willie is 
well worthy such a mother. But the rest of 
them are mortals like myself 

You and David must visit fast as possfole. 
Try on each other's coats and hats, and ex- 
claim, •'• What perfect fits !" pay each other 
compliments, as you gentlemen do, get angry, 
make up friends, &c. &c., then set your face 
eastward. I give you leave to stop in R., and 
say all the nice things possible to Miss M., 
only so you say them fast But you and 
Sibyl need not flatter yourselves that I shall 
again sit quiet and let you two talk all the 
time ; and spar, and cast out your leads to 
sound each other ; not a bit of it. I knew you 
long first, and old claims should always be 
regarded ; besides you are not to look at hei 
while you talk to me either. I will leave it to 
David if I am not right, and not at all exact- 
ing. 



126 A PLACE IN THY MEMOKY. 

I wish there was in this world one othei 
spirit that now and then could fly off in tan- 
gent raptures, like poor Ned. Why, they 
might have all the ecstasies of seven worlds 
crowded into this one little terraqueous wheel- 
ing orb, and yet talk of brighter days to come. 
He has come home again from the South, 
with his head so completely turned with admi- 
ration for that little Creole, that he talks of 
her all the time, when not abusing his bad 
English. 



Geneva^ June^ 1848. 

Cousin Will : — I have lived long enough 
to learn that things are not always what they 
seem. As ripples play lightly upon the smooth 
surface of a summer sea, while far below dark 
and turbid waters are waiting the storm-god to 
move them to fury, so a smiling brow, often 
conceals a storm of revengeful passion. Words 
of love and friendship often tremble on the 
lips, while curses nestle in the heart. So all 
through life, things are not Avhat they seem. 



APPEARANCES DECEIVING. 127 

A show of affluence is often as true an index 
of poverty, as want itself. The poorest of tho 
metals is often mistaken for the richest coin ; so 
by means of art and worldly tact, man may 
palm off his ignorance for knowledge, and his 
vice for virtue. So again, a man of wisdom, 
clad in mean attire, and surrounded by homely 
circumstances, may be as easily mistaken for 
the ignorant and unaspiring. When the mo- 
tive is not known or appreciated, how differ- 
ently the act appears ; and we find ourselves 
to-day censurmg a deed which to-morrow we 
may loudly applaud. Therefore, " Be not 
wise in thine own conceit," and " Judge not, 
that ye be not judged," are sayings worthy of 
all acceptation. The youth who to-day plays 
on the green with a herd of other ragged lads, 
observed but to be pitied, may in a few years 
contend honors with La Place and Newton, 
and read titles with Lord Rosse and the starry 
\t^ Verrier. 



128 A PLACE IN THY MEMOR^V 



My dear Mrs. Snow . — I have no " sight- 
seeings in Europe " to picture you, no history 
of blood and tears to write, no storms of ocean, 
nor clustered beauties of Naples, and its rival 
bay Rio Janeiro to describe, nor ruins to paint, 
save those of a broken heart ; among which 
the voice of buried love ever moans, like the 
sighings of decay amid fallen temples and 
mouldering castles. 

We have our preferences as well for things 
as persons. Of all the trees on these grounds I 
love most this branching mulberry ; it shades 
me oftenest when the sun is bright, and when 
the night dews are heavy on its leaves, i^ 
covers still my brow, till long after the moon 
has waned and many stars have set. Oh, 
never breathe to human ear thy sorrow, but 
soothe thy grief in humble prayer ; and when 
thy full heart goes up to Heaven, let none but 
spirits hear. 

My liand has become a perfect truant, placing 
the letters now on one side of the line, and 
now on the other ; to remedy this we use a 



NOTHING COULD CALL THEM BACK. 129 

grooved card under the paper and write with 
a pencil, which accounts for the strange-look- 
ing sheet I send you. Not long since I heard 

Dr. T say in a sermon, " it is a principle 

of our nature to prize that highest we are most 
troubled to get;" no matter, then, if you are 
puzfeled a little to decipher these erratic 
words. 

Four weeks ago our school closed ; and a 
party of some fifty went on board the Santa 
Claus for Albany, thence by the cars to their 
respective residences. Others on the same 
day left for their homes in New- York and its 
vicinity, till very, very few were left. Night 
came, and the halls and corridors, so accus- 
tomed to echo with merry laugh and tread, 
and sounds of music, from the large organ 
down to the trumpet whistle, were all silent ; 
and departure seemed whispered every where. 
Little Henry, who ran back to the sick room 
once more to say good-hy to poor Jakey, was 
unfortunately left. When he returned to the 
lower hall, behold, the omnibuses were far 
away, and nothing could call them back or 
stay their progress. We tried to comfort him, 
6* 



1 30 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

but all his full heart cowZcZ say was, ^^ I wain 
to go home.^^ 

The moon was on the hills, the stars came 
out, and the shades of night had fallen beauti- 
fully on all the weary world ; we were sleep- 
ing forgetful and happy, when suddenly the 
spacious dormitory, the chapel, and all the 
empty rooms were filled with sweet sounds, 
which seemed pouring in at the windows and 
sifting down from among the trees. "What 
is it, and where is it ?" every one starting up, 
almost wondering if the spirits of the Blind 
had not come back to serenade those they had 
left. " The Bird Waltz," says one, as its 
chirpings w^ere echoing every where ; it was 
none other than the Christies themselves, 
gathered among the firs in the front yard to 
give our loneliness a serenade. They played 
long and beautifully. Lovely May and other 
of their Ethiopian songs were never half so 
sweet, for which we could make them no com- 
pliments. We had no bouquets to toss them, 
no lamps to light, and could only enjoy their 
music in silence ; but when our quick ears 
followed their departing footsteps, our love and 



WE WERE LONELY. 13 

giutitude would have turned their harps tc 
gold, such as minstrels wake beyond the 
sky. 

In the morningj as each seemed to know bette! 
the feelings of the other, we were more silent, 
and our breakfast had little relish. One after 
another left the dining-room, till, when the 
moment came for the bell, there were none to 
dismiss. I took my portfolio and came to this 
favorite tree. Presently the girls began to 
pass, walking as usual, two and two, with 
their arms encircling each other's waist, for 
the mutual protection it affords. Says one 
to her mate, "During vacation I will teach 
you six songs, with the symphonies and 
accompaniments, if you will teach me those 
Herz's Exercises you know, and some pieces 
of Mozart and Haydn." "Agreed," was the 
reply ; "I will tell you one of them now, and 
then we will go and practise it." Said an- 
other, " When I finish my spread, I'm going 
tc knit a purse and bag to send to my aunt." 
Another, " I shall knit nothing but star and 
oak-leaf tidies this vacation, and one coat for a 
present to little Georgie ;" so they went on, 



132 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

" innoc(?nt creatures," crossing again and agam 
the angling walks, some counting the positions 
and bars of music, some planning pastimes, 
and others wondering who of their mates had 
reached Home. 

^'Come, sit you down here, girls," said I, 
" and I will tell you a story, if you please." 
" Oh ! good, good," exclaimed every one, and 
in a moment they were all planted upon the 
green sward, in the best listening mood pos- 
sible. I told them the tale of " Aunt Mercy," 
after which we arranged to meet every morn- 
ing, and I was to repeat, as well as memory 
could bring it back, a chapter of AVarren's 
" Now and Then," which Mr. Hastings read 
to me last winter. Then each in her turn 
promised to do the same from some volume 
which she had heard. Little Jenny begged to 
be excused, said she never could keep awake 
the readmg hour, and bad forgotten all the 
stories she ever heard. Caty complained that 
it always took all her time to keep Helen still, 
so she had heard none of the reading matter 
either. Unless she could think of something 
oetter, Mary proposed treating us to some of 



MORNING WORE AWAY. 133 

Wilson's " Tales of the Border." Maggie 
spoke of some chapters from the " Diary of a 
Physician/' but, said she, they all end so 
sadly. 

Employment is truly the chariot-wheel of 
the soul ; without it we only drag weary ex- 
istence along. The morning wore away, and 
the two months' vacation began to seem a little 
life-time, and all the days " dark and dreary P 

Towards evening, to my delight and as- 
tonishment, Miss S. returned. " Get your bon- 
net and shawl," said she. " I could not go to 
Boston, and leave you here so lonely ; I have 
come to take you to Brooklyn, to stop a little time 
with some friends ;" and the last two weeks I 
passed at the delightful home of Mr. and Mrs. 
Emory, and Mr. Augustus Graham, a very in- 
teresting old gentlemen, if indeed it is at all 
proper to call a man old^ merely because the 
frosts of many winters have blanched his locks 
and deepened the furrows on his brow, while he 
still retains the mental freshness of youth and 
all the acting excellence of half his years, 
Mr. Graham is a native of Edinburgh, edu- 
cated in London ; some fifty years since he came 



134 A PI.Al.'E IN THY MEMORY. 

to New-York, wliero by his own industiy and 
economy he has amassed a fortune which now, 
in his dechning years, he is distributing for 
the rehef of the unfortunate and distressed, 
with a hand as hberal and free as the heart of 
benevolence and philanthropy could ask. 

On our Nation's last birth-day, Mr. Graham 
presented to the Brooklyn Institute and Hos- 
pital the pretty sum of fifty thousand. 01 1, 
who would not wish the power of dispensing 
good so freely / In a word, who would not 
like to be rich ? Mr. Graham's apartments 
are caskets of choice books, paintings, engrav 
ings, (fcc. One day, speaking of Paris, he 
placed in m^A hands a little relic of the Bastile, 
which he procured as follows : Passing ovei 
the grounds, and finding nothing worth pre- 
serving, the guide took him around by the outer 
wall where he spied, far up in a niche, a figure 
bereft of every limb that seemed breakable^ save 
one finger, pointing in lone astonishment to the 
shades of misery Avhich must ever haunt the 
grounds of the Bastile. Being a pretty good 
Benjamite, Mr. G. threw a stone and felled 
the finger to the ground. '• Come," said the 



RELIC FROM THE BASTILE. 135 

guiie. '^ we had best be going from this place, 
or those guards will be after us." So Mr. G. 
pocketed quickly his well-earned relic, and 
walked away. The finger has on it the in- 
denture of the nail and the little creases of the 
first and second joint, as perfectly as though 
chiselled but now. 



Institution for the Blind, 

My good friend Mr. D. : — When I look 
over the past I cannot see that either in my let- 
ters or interviews I have ever added to your 
mind one pleasing thought, and yet you bear 
with me. 

The veneration I ever feel for your worth 
and character so silence my words and restrain 
my actions, when in your presence, that I often 
think that you may with good reason suppose 
me wanting in the grateful love I should che- 
rish for so valuable a friend. But believe me, 
Mr. D., if your dear Augusta! and Juliet were 
my own sisters, I could not love and esteem 
you more. 



136 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

My remaining sight you probably value aa 
little as I do ; but this I do desire, tf^ see tht3 
time when my eyes will cease to trouble me. 
I cannot arrange sentences sufficient for a 
letter, listen to an hour's reading, or practise 
the least, or spend an evening in conversation; 
but the morbid irritation in the nerves and 
muscles of my eyes becomes so painful as to 
keep me awake nearly the whole night. Three 
years I have submitted passively to the pre- 
scriptions and decisions of the faculty, never 
once lifting my voice approvingly or otherwise. 

Last summer the advice of all the doctors 
was, " Go to the springs ; showering and bath- 
ing will do more for you than medicine." But 
that was impossible. Others again urged me 
to return and try the water-cure in New- York. 
To that various objections wore raised ; indeed 
[ knew nothing of it myself until a friend gave 
it a very satisfactory trial. She has a minia 
ture apparatus, douche and shower-bath in hei 
own house, which I used some time last winter 
with much benefit both to my general health and 
eyes. Now, you see Mr. D. what I am at : I 
do very much wish to pass one week or 



MY ORACLE. 137 

two in the water-cure establishment somewhere 
in New- York. I have a conviction that it wii"i 
both remedy my dyspepsia and consequent ir- 
ritation of my eyes. May I make the experi- 
ment ? 

My spirit sees no look of disapproval in 
your thoughts. However, you will tell me 
plainly what you think of it, and your 
words shall be my oracle ; I will ask no other. 
Pray pardon me for troubling you, and believe 
that T only desire to know and do the right. 



Stone Cotlaore, June, 1849. 



■^O^i 



An hour ago I bathed in the crystal waters 
that flow fast by the cottage door, then with 
Mary followed up their winding way, treading 
on the soft shadows of nightfall, which come 
to sleep among the bushes and flowers. 

This afternoon we crossed the bridge up the 
hill road to the wood, and deep in its shade 



1S8 A i'LACE IN THY MEMORY. 

sat US down, and opened the book which Mary 
had brought to read. So every day, with my 
head pillowed in her lap, and her little hand 
on my brow, I beguile the hours which other- 1 
wise were long and weary. 

The clouds are thick about me, 1 cannot see 
the face of one Angel, nor hear the flitting of a 
wing, nor the echo of a harp, nor one whisper 
on the breeze. My heart is hard and I cannot 
weep. I am not good or I were more blessed 
and more happy, and more like the sweet spi- 
rits, who with folded pinions linger unseen 
above our pathway, ever beckoning us on in 
the good and right way. 

Oh that I could dissolve my thoughts and 
mould them anew, free from all evil. Oh, 
that in the light of heaven I could whiten 
my immortal nature from all the stains which 
sin has made. Then my soul would put on 
her wings and go to breathe the expansive 
airs of heaven, and seize upon the revelations 
of her spiritual being, and learn her destiny in 
the future life, whither to our shortsightedness 
the way is unmarked, and to our weak fliith 
and little courage her realities are solemn and 



LIVING FOR GOD. 139 

fearfui, and when we would enter there and 
grow famihar with its white scenes, something 
earthly draws us back, and whispers, " not 
yet, no, not yet." Oh, my soul, when wilt 
thou be ready? when will thy work be done? 
when wilt thou rise and set thy house in or- 
der, and see to it that thy charities be all num- 
bered, and thy goods be distributed to the poor, 
and hasten thy feet to the abodes of the dis- 
tressed, set thy hand to smooth the pillow of 
the sick, and place cooling waters to his fevered 
lips? Thy field of labor is in this life, and 
what thou wouldst do for God, thou must do 
for his creatures 



Insiiluiion for the Blind. June 12th, 1848. 

Friend Mumford: — I find here so little 
incident, so little that is sufficiently suggestive 
to awaken and call forth those lively emotions 
which make the soul of epistolary writing, that 
1 really approach it with diffidence. 

Besides, you must not expect me to invest 
my pages with that coloring and vivacity that 



140 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

I would, were I mingling more with the world. 
Retirement is favorable to sentiment, but pent- 
up feelings die, and unexpressed and unshared 
thoughts do wither. 

We are so constituted that suggestive so- 
ciety of some kind is needful, as well for our 
health and happiness as our mental culture. 
Thinking is perhaps a more healthful exercise 
for the mind than reading, for books are but 
the symbols of thought and feeling ; and as the 
substance is preferred to the shadow, so the 
original is better than the copy. The sources 
of conversation and locality from which we 
can derive any positive improvement, cover 
only a little space in the learned world ; to the 
active mind, hardly more than the boundary 
that girts the infant's cradle. 

The future is unknown. AVe have not an 
eye like the Infinite, to pierce its dark veil, and 
read its mystic lore. To the past, then, we 
must go for knowledge, and books are its only 
chronicles, the only caskets in which its price- 
less pearls are set. To me the temples of 
knowledge are all barred, and its fountains are 
dried or turned to rocks, and 1 have no powef 



HOW TO PLEASE. 141 

10 bring again their gushing waters. I may 
no more drink from the streams of Pioria, or 
sip the dews of CastaUa. 

Evermore mine is the brow of night, whose 
stars are set. Flowers are at my feet, and 
dews Uke diamonds are scattered all around, 
but the light is gone, and I cannot see them. 
Grief has long had a place in my heart, and 
melancholy and sorrow have been familiar; 
but to-day something like the shadow of des- 
pair is nestling there. Oh God ! save me, save 
me, oh God! There is a wildness in my 
thoughts, a dread, o torturing fear that is swal- 
lowing up my very life in wretchedness, more 
than words can speak. How real sorrow doth 
deceive the world ! She weeps the long night 
away, and at morn puts on a sunny brow to 
meet those around her ; and while they won- 
der at her cheerful joy, she answers well and 
wisely too ; '• ills are only severe blessings, and 
when received with a prepared heart, they do 
ds the greater good." Besides, if we would 
please others, we must ourselves at least seem 
to be pleased; and it is well when, as Gold- 
smith says of the French, we grow to be what 



142 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

we seem. Common pity mixed with common 
scorn I do despise, my soul loathes the very 
word: but give me your friendship growing 
from esteem, and I will thank you and love 
you too ; and such as my poor heart has will 
1 give in return, and perhaps in our little com- 
merce we may both grow richer. 

You remember deaf Maggie. To-day I 
engaged to entertain her, but her senseless 
gibberings have wearied and sickened every 
feeling, till my spirit cries, "How long, Oh 
Lord ! how long V One can play the philan- 
thropist to the low and ignorant, and share 
their little thoughts, and if possible try to lift 
them higher, and with ready delight minister 
to their wants ; but to be ever companioned 
with them, to be herded one of them, is hard 
to beai". 

My whole nature thirsts for a higher and 
niDre improving intercourse, and longs to feast 
again upon the beauties of kindling and in- 
spiring thoughts. We are progressive beings, 
and our every act, every thought or emotion, 
should be a step in our progressive life As 
the least blow upon this little earth, in its acting 



GREATER THAN A GENIUS 143 

and reacting force is felt through the iiUmita- 
ble fields of space, and that eternally, so man's 
most simple word or feeling, in its effects will 
remain unmeasured, when matter's last atom 
shal . have wandered back to that chaos, 
whence it came forth. 

You say you make no claims to genius ; very 
true ; but you have what in my opinion should 
be prized far more, an entire set of strong na- 
tural powers, developed by early culture, disci- 
plined by self-application, and inspired by the 
love of truth. Such a mind may begi^ where 
genius leaves off, and I see no reason why you 
may not cope with Newton in his measure- 
ment of the spheres, or follow the heaven-led 
operations of Milton's mind ; ascend the intel- 
lectual throne of Bacon, or handle the more 
weighty reasonings of Locke. 

The pathway that meanders up the steeps 
of Parnassus is laid open, and he who kindles 
his aspirations with ambition's fire may scale 
its dizzy heights, where, with the key of sci- 
ence in his hand, he may unlock the mysteries 
of nature ; decipher the symbols that hide the 
Chald's sublimer lore ; may read the finger- 



144 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



marks of Him whose hand has spread 
the starry cope, and strown with gems the 
ocean cave. Nature, in converse with him, 
will speak in her own familiar tongue. With 
the finger of philosophy he may grasp the 
" lightning's fiery wing," may rend asunder the 
air, impearl the briny wave, that since time's 
dawn has lashed the beachen shore. The de- 
composition of the granite rock of the ever- 
lasting hills shall be to him but the amusement 
of an hour. With La Place, he may feel all 
the tremblings of the waning moon ; with 
Plato's ravished ears he may list the music of 
the chanting spheres, till his spirit plumes its 
pinions, and, with flight sublime, soars to 
Truth's occult abode. * * * 

P. S. I forgot to tell you that it is vacation, 
and in the absence of Miss M., Sibyl is playing 
matron in the most dignified and judicious 
manner ; that is, the casks in the store-room 
are being freely relieved of their deposits, as, 
you know, she believes in a circulating me- 
dium tending to the general good. 



CONFLICTING EMOTIONS. 145 



Long Island Water- Cure, Sept. 1 2, 1848. 

My good friend Mr. D. : — Your note 
came yesterday, and the parcel last evening. 
Mrs. Nott has returned. She read your letter, 
then gave me an account of her very pleas- 
ant interview. It is certainly gratifying to 
have persons so knowing and so good as Mr. 
D. and Mrs. N., so kindly interested in my 
poor behalf But oh, how gladly would I re- 
lieve all my friends of farther anxiety. Yes, 
how gladly would I put forth my hand to meet 
my own wants. Sometimes this feeling does 
so possess me, that I am almost desirous of 
relieving the world of one so troublesome, but 
never more shall I be sufficient to myself I 
am in the world, and cannot conveniently get 
out of it. So I am in the hands of God. He 
has placed me among my fellows, and veiled 
my eyes, perhaps as much to try them as me, 
for certainly, go where I Avill, I am always 
tasking some hand, and sharing the generous 
sympathies of some heart, 

I am certainly much more strong and 
7 



146 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

healthful than when I came here. The nerves 
of my eyes are still very weak and irritable, 
though their inflamed appearance is rapidly 

leaving them. Dr. asked me the othei 

day how I would like to pass the winter here ; 
I replied, '•' I should be most happy to do so, 
but that is quite impossible." He then asked 
if I could be as contented here as at the Insti- 
tution; I told him " this was a world of delight 
compared with it, setting aside all considera- 
tions of health." He then remarked, " I think 
we must keep you here through the winter, we 
shall be less in number then, and more like a 
family." Now what idea the Dr. had of my 
staying here, is more than I can conceive ; it 
does not seem possible that he thinks of ex- 
tending his kindness so far, to one whom he 
knows so little. And surely he has no reason 
to expect a compensation, from any source 
which I can imagine ; so, in all probability 1 
shall leave here two weeks from Wednesday. 
1 have gathered many ideas of correct living 
which I value exceedingly ; besides, 1 have 
made very many pleasing acquaintances, of 
whom I will tell you more by and by. 



GRATITUDE. 147 

If my poor eyes were well, I would write a 
course of letters from here, and the many 

things I could say of Dr. 's establishment, 

might do a little to compensate him for the 
great kindness he has shown me. Not that I 
coLild add anything to the much that has been 
said, but you know sometimes the simple, un- 
varnished story of a patient, tells more in favor 
of the doctor than all of his long and well- 
written essays upon Materia Medica, Theory 
and Practice. 

Indeed when I come home, I shall do little 
but preach cold water, and plain diet ; for cer- 
tainly Hydropathy has not a more thorough 
convert. All the ladies read your letter, and 
laughed much at that slip of your pen. 

Mrs. Judge N , of Ohio, is a patient 

here ; she was delighted with your remarks on 
woman, and said they accorded precisely with 
her husband's views. 

Then Mrs. B is really getting well ! 

Thank God for so great a favor. We could 
not spare her. The world is very dark and 
lonely now, notwithstanding I have so many 
friends, so many loved ones. I have this 



148 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



morning unfortunately glanced a little beyond 
the coming two weeks, and consequently a 
shade of sadness covers my thoughts ; but no 
matter, all will be well. 

Kind regards to your dear family. Mr. 
Briggs is probably again with you : you are 
mdeed among the favored. I think of your 
Sabbaths all day. Do not forget, I am to hear 

Mr. 's Thanksgiving sermon, and the 

first after his return from Europe. 

Now, good-by, Mr. D , with as much 

gratitude and love as my simple heart can 
nold. 

P. S. I do not much regret the delay of my 
note, since it came to you so illustriously com 
panioned. How the simple thing must have 
blushed being read, while your thoughts were 
full of words from the burning pen of the S'-^^e 
of Ashland. 



THE AMBITIOUS YOUTH. 149 



Stone Cottage^ August, 1849. 

Cousin Will : — Your last poem pleases 
me exceedingly. I see you have truly the 
soul of a poet, and I very well understand 
your desire to travel, and apparent dissatisfac- 
tion with the tame way in which you are 
passing your time. No one more than I would 
like you to see the wind-god shake old ocean 
by his mane, and feast your eye on the Alps 
and Apennines, and watch their lakes when 
'•red morn glows on their breasts." But, 
Cousin Will, a poet too well fed, or too much 
indulged, is apt to lose his muse. It is hard 
blows you need instead of gentle ones. You 
are an only child, the pride of doting parents, 
and your home is lined with books and papers, 
and you have tutors and masters always at 
hand. Hence if I sympathize at all with you, 
it will be because you are too much favored ; 
for if we lift the curtain of the past, and back- 
waid wander, however far, we find written in 
legible characters upon every page of man's 
liistory — no excellence is obtained without 



150 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



labor. Poverty, Cousin Will, is the nursery 
of genius, and toil he must who would excel 
in any course, or have it said of him, he was 
great or good. Young men of aliluence, 
having little else to do than feast upon the 
bounties which Providence has assigned 
them, and bask in the dawn of new enjoy- 
ments, are but seldom disposed to contend for 
meeds of honor, obtained only at the expense 
of unwearied application and self-denial. 

But they often enter the literary course, and 
for a time may walk in advance of those less 
favored than themselves, until by self-indulg- 
ence and irresolution, they become effeminate ; 
fluctuate, and, to their mortification, yield the 
palm to their poor but persevering competi 
tors ; who gradually advance step by step, 
treading down every obstruction, and boldly 
surmounting every barrier ; nor tarrying in all 
the mountain way until they reach the goal, 
and grasp the object of their anxious but 
deferred hopes. 

The orb of science never shone so brightly 
on Egypt's monuments of art and grandeur, as 
when her poor youth, whose eyes beamed with 



TRUE MERIT. 15i 

native intelligence, were sought after, and 
welcomed to her classic halls and bowers. 
And the Grecian stage was favored with its 
richest productions, while those priests of 
nature who dwelt in the upland caves, came 
down bare-headed and bare-footed, to be the 
worthy competitors of kings. 

In Rome, the seven-hilled city of Fame, 
whose halls are stored with the treasures of 
intellect, we find the richest gems of which 
the world can boast. But the fathers of her 
philosophy and poetry had no other claims to 
distinction or honor, than those of true merit, 
xind could we map to our view the panorama 
of six thoTisand years, we would, in every age 
and in every land, find those to whom science 
owes her improvements, those who have wor- 
shipped at the shrine of art, those whose 
hands have guided safely the helm in the 
hour of a nation's peril, were not only de- 
prived of the luxuries of life, but were often 
strangers to its most common comforts. And 
while toiling in their onward and upward 
way, the aristocracy of wealth frowned upon 
them; and while they battled bravely life's 



152 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



pitiless Storms, persecuting slander often 
hurled her envenomed arrows at their vener- 
able and defenceless heads ; and but for that 
unyielding and obstinate determination whicii 
never fails, they had, with the multitude, 
passed unknown away. 

We see the high-mmded philosopher, Galileo, 
soliciting the loan of a few shillings to pur- 
chase materials for constructing an instrument 
with which he afterwards shook the groat 
foundations of error. Tycho Brahe said, if he 
owed the world any thing, it was for its untiring 
opposition. The learned Kepler said his life 
had been only a scene of wants and priva- 
tions. Rollin, a star of moral beauty, ran 
when a boy with the herd of other ragged lads 
to say mass ; but that ethereal spirit, which 
beamed from his eagle eye and expansive 
brow, snatched him a gem from the mud, and 
bade him shine for ever in the splendors oi 
his own genius. 

Columbus, whose soul when unfurled leap- 
ed across the sea and laid bare a world," 
you knr)w, lived and died stung to his heart's 
«ore with want and neglect. The richest 



I WILL TRY. 153 

minds England has produced were pearls 
brought up from the darkest obscurity. Kirke 
White, the genius of musings; Shakspeare, 
tc whom nature gave her magic wand; 
Ciiatterton, Sir Humphrey Davy, and his 
student the bookbinder, in a coarse frock, 
now no less than Chemist Royal. 

Napoleon, when he saw his ranks becoming 
thin, grasped the standard in his own hand, 
rushed forward, leaping over bodies of the 
slain like a spirit of the storm till the victory 
was his. Thus have arisen to excellence mul- 
titudes with whom the Fates loved to war. 
So there are moments in the lives of all when 
a word, a resolve, or a single step seems to be 
a pivot upon which their whole destiny turns 
either for weal or woe ; and that moment with 
you, Cousin Will, is now. During the late 
war a British battery, stationed upon a hill, 
considerably annoyed our troops ; '•' Can you 
storm that battery?" said General Ripley to 
Colonel Miller. " I will try, Sir," was the 
laconic answer. Now, only rise and arm your 
most lofty aspirations with Colonel Miller's 

weapon, and victory is yours. The world is 

"7* 



154 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



the great drama upon which each individual 
IS to act his part with honor or infamy, as he 
will himself choose ; but there is a fame which 
will last when the skies of worldly glory arc 
darkened, and her scrolls have gone to decay; 
upon her pure escutcheon are written the 
" names of those whom the love of God has 
blest ;" whose hands have helped to plant the 
great standard of reform and the amelioration 
of mankind ; who have added their vial to the 
river whose waters flow for the healing of the 
nations. Continue in the paths of virtue, daily 
adding to your stores of knowledge from those 
valuable receptacles of the wisdom of all 
ages — books. Seek to shine like some of the 
iewels which decorate the temple of our free- 
dom, and leave your name with those to 
wnose memory rock-hewn monuments are but 
mockery. Try to be great in the spirit of 
God, like John Wesley, John Newton, and ouj 
Edwards, the vein of whose eloquence flowed 
only to fertilize the desolation of the human 
heart. 

The most pov/erful imagination, is thai 
which embodies truth in living characters ; and 



THE BIRTH-DAY. 155 

the most imperishable fame is the memory of 
him who made the world better by living in it. 



Union College, Schenectady, June B6lh, 1849. 

My good friend Mr. D. : — You are su:h 
a devotee to science and literature, or, in other 
words, such a devourer of books, and every thing 
in the way of intelligence, it seems fitting 
I should write to you while at one of the 
finest seats of learning in our State, and at the 
feet of one greater than Gamaliel. 

Dr. Nott, you are aware, has been forty-five 
years President of this Institution. He passed, 
yesterday, his seventy-sixth birth-day, appa- 
rently in possession of as many physical and 
mental energies as are ordinarily the compa- 
nions of men of half his years — hearing his 
classes, attending to all the calls of his stu- 
dents, listening to and correcting their rheto- 
rical exercises, preparatory to the coming com- 
mencement. 

In the morning, while the Doctor was read- 



156 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



mg the papers, a committee of the senior class 
waited upon him, requesting permission to 
have a general college celebration of his birth- 
day. At this the good sage seemed much sur- 
prised, and asked, " How in the world did you 
learn that ? Really, I did not know it myself ; 
out if it be so, boys, that I am another year 
older, and you wish to celebrate it, you must 
do it in the way I am going to — work with all 
your might." " But," said they, " we would 
like to illuminate the college." " Illuminate the 
college !" said he, '' why what an idea ! such a 
thing was never done." " Why yes," said the 
students, " the first year you came here it was 
illuminated." ^' Not hardly," said the doctor, 
" for if I remember rightly, we had no col- 
lege to illuminate." " But," said they, " they 
hung the lamps in the trees, which meant the 
same thing." So the dialogue went on, and 
at last terminated by the Doctor's consenting to 
let the senior class come to his house in the 
evening, for an informal levee, specifying that 
they should all go home precisely at ten o'clock. 
The older I grow, the more I see how averse 
the learned and sensible always are to any 



THE LEVEE. 151 

thing like show or ostentation. During the 
day many old and tried friends called upon 
the Doctor and his lady, and offered their con- 
gratulations that another year had been added 
to his long and useful life ; hoping that he 
would be spared to them many more. Many 
presents were sent in, among them a beautifu, 
bouquet to Mrs. Nott, and to the Doctor a large 
ripe orange of domestic growth, with stem and 

leaves still attached. Mc , who you know 

is figuring so largely as a statesman, sent by 
express an engraving of himself, large as life, 
and elegantly framed, accompanied by a note. 
While Mrs. Nott and Professor Potter were 
selecting the most appropriate place for hanging 
it, the Doctor says, " I have it, hang him in 
the college libra ry, where he should have been 
himself long ago. But a fine fellow that Mc 

, and he knows a pretty good deal too, 

notwithstanding." 

The professors and their ladies, the tutors 
and other officers of the college, were present 
at the party, and altogether the evening passed 
both profitably and pleasantly. The Doctor 
ivas in fine spirits, entertaining the groups 



158 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



who thronged about him. with vivid delinea- 
tions of the master-spirits of the last genera 
tion, with most of whom he was intimate. 
Some one asked him whether he thought 
Hamilton or Webster the greater man ? He 
replied, Hamilton, for Webster has lived to do 
much since Hamilton died ; and besides, the 
greatest efforts of Hamilton have never been 
published. 

Through his long life, the Doctor has been 
a devoted student of eloquence ; this is as evi- 
dent in his common conversation, as from his 
sermons and writings. His words are not so 
select, as his manner is impressive ; conse- 
quently you cannot hear him speak, without 
being more or less influenced. The best fea- 
ture in the evening's entertainment was the 
good Doctors address to the whole assembly. 
He dwelt with great emphasis upon the fact, 
that men do not live out half their days, in 
consequence of infractions upon the physical 
laws of their being. He said one-fifth of the 
human race die before they are twelve months 
old, one-third before they are two years, and 
one-half before they are twenty. Now nothing 



PHYSICAL LAWS. 159 

analogous to this is found among other ani- 
mals ; all other species live, with but few 
exceptions, to a certain and uniform age. 
Whence, then, this fearful mortality among 
men? If you give as a reason the fall of 
Adam, to this I rej^ly, that even after the fail 
of Adam men lived to near a thousand years. 
The truth is, young gentlemen, that man, the 
only animal endowed with reason and the 
higher attributes, is almost the only animal 
that outrages the plain and obvious laws of 
his nature. The Doctor then, by way of illus- 
tration, remarked upon his own plain mode of 
living, his constant use of cold baths, and his 
abstaining from all stimulants, both in food 
and drink. Life, said he, is the most precious 
of Heaven's gifts, and I have no doubt all be- 
fore me would like to extend it to the greatest 
numbei of years possible. In the early pan 
of the evening, one of the students, Mr. Mc- 
Coy, (a young man of decided talent,) read 
aloua some very appropriate passages from the 
Dard of Avon, one from Henry IV., another 
from the speech of Adam in " As you like it ;" 
which seemed written almost expressly for the 



160 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



occasion and the venerable person for whom 
it was selected : 

" Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty; 
For in my youth I never did apply 
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood. 
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo 
The means of weakness and debility ; 
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter, 
Frosty, but kindly." 

Just before the company dispersed, the ven^ 
erable Doctor referred in a touching manner to 
the separation that would soon take place be- 
tween the teachers and the class before him, 
and besought them to live in constant refer- 
ence to the judgment-day, to prepare for which 
all others are given. " I charge you," said he, 
"let not one before me, on that tremendous day, 
be absent from the right hand of God ; that 
shoidd it be my happiness to be found there 
also, I may be permitted to exclaim, ' Here, 
Lord, am /, and the children Thou ha^t conir 
trdtted to my care.'' " And then in behalf of 
all present, offered a most affecting and solemn 
prayer to the Father of all our mercies. His 
reference to the pestilence that walketh in 



A MOMENT FOR ALL. 161 

darkness, and the destruction that wasteth at 
noonday, was very affecting. In compliance 
with his petition, one could almost see the de- 
stroying angel returning his raging sword to 
the scabbard, and pronouncing it enough. 

This morning we had a delightful drive in 
the Doctor's three- wheeled buggy which is a 
singular sort of vehicle, but exceedingly con- 
venient for getting in and out, besides it is 
quite impossible to upset it. 

I enjoy Mrs. Nott's society here even more 
than at Long Island, she is so amiable and 
lovely. Though there is seemingly no end tc 
her duties and calls, yet she always finds a 
little time tor every one. The most important 
star in all the sky shines with a mild but 
steady ray ; such is ever the influence and 
power of woman ; noiseless, but constant, she 
rarely competes with man in the varied depart- 
ments of science and literature, yet, by her 
silent labors and gentle teachings, she often 
rules the fate of empires and decides the 
destinies of kings. 

The evening I left you at your residence, I 
had no idea that m forty-eight hours I should 



162 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



become so much of an alarmist as to leave 
New- York so hurriedly. But when people are 
so congregated and necessarily so many in 
one room, as at the Institution, tie liability to 
contagion is greatly increased. I believe you 
puipose remaining in the city during the 
entire season. May God protect you, and, 
among his richest blessings, prolong your 
invaluable life. I am going to a remote part 
of the country, where the mountains lift 
their heads and stretch out their arms to pro- 
tect ; and the river that flows at their feet has 
never borne on its wave the breath of disease : 
still insidious cholera may come even there. 



Le Roy Female Seminary, July 13/A, 1849. 

Dear Mary : — Nearly 2500 years ago the 
Persian armies, commanded by Xerxes, enter- 
ed ancient Athens, and in an evil hour behold 
th£.t great city wrapped in flames ; its walls 
broken, and its white marble edifices and 



ATHENIAN CASE. 163 

temples, dedicated to the gods, enveloped in 
smoke and marked for ruin. Where so late 
art and science, life and beauty reigned, 
destruction, fire, darkness and decay made 
their homes. Now the meanest reptiles crawl 
in the halls of kings, and solitary toads go 
noiselessly over the banquet floors — and the 
dark bat sleeps where the birds of Jove plumed 
their glittei-ing wings — and the moss and ivy 
grow and feed upon the dust of princes — and 
the owl, sacred bird of the Athenians, for ever 
booms above its ruins. 

Seven years since Miss Wright, from this 
seminary, went to Smyrna to teach the Pro- 
testant children of the Mediterranean. After 
a term of four years, she left Smyrna and 
came to Athens, where she remained two 
years, and gathered meantime this choice 
collection of relics. They are placed on 
shelves in a sort of closet with glass doors ; i^. 
says over the top, " Athenian Case ;" for there 
are several other similar cases in the room, 
one of minerals, another of shells, &c. Yes- 
tsrday Miss Wright took them all down, and 
placed them one after another in my hands, 



164 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



and descrioed them so perfectly, that it 
seems to me 1 have really seen them. And 
Mary, to-day I will in fancy do the same for 
you. First, here is a little clay lamp, which 
was dug from the ruins ; you see it is shaped 
like the half of a goose-egg, and about as 
large. It has a little tube on the top of one 
side for the wick, and some little holes in the 
middle, where the oil was poured in ; and they 
answered also for a vent. It is a rude thing, 
but we cannot know what great purposes it 
has answered in the world. Perhaps by its 
hght Aristophanes wove his brilliant comedies. 
Or it may have belonged to Plato, and sat 
upon his little classic table, Avhile he wrote his 
dialogues and twelve letters ; the elegance, 
melody, and sweetness of which, you know, so 
pleased the people, that they entitled him the 
Athenian bee. Let us see ; Socrates' father 
was a statuary, and for several years the 
great philosopher followed the same employ- 
ment. Here is one of the Athenian gods, and 
perhaps it was chiselled by his own hand, and 
one of those which he was afterwards accused 
of ridiculing ; which to us would seem a very 



SOCRATES. 165 

slight offence, but then nothing could atone for 
it but death. In the o)d v/orld, as in the new, 
innocence was never safe ; since time began 
she has been exposed to the tongue of slander. 
Socrates was adorned by every virtue and 
stained by no vice, and his high-soided inde- 
pendence and freedom of speech upon all 
subjects, for many years placed him beyond 
suspicion and malevolence. But after the 
witty and unprincipled Aristophanes had 
once ventured to ridicule the venerable char- 
acter of Socrates in one of his comedies upon 
the stage, the way was opened, and praise 
soon gave place to criticism and censure. 
Envy hurled at him her poisoned arroAvs, and 
jealousy, in the voices of Miletus, Aritus and 
Lycon, stood forth to recriminate him ; and 
good Socrates was summoned before the 
tribunal of five hundred, accused of corrupt- 
ing the Athenian youth, and ridiculing the 
many gods which the Athenians worshipped. 
Here, Mary, is a little earthen bowl, which 
does not seem to differ much from the pottery 
of our day, though it has lain under ground 
more than two thousand years. If not the 



166 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY 



same, it was probably one like it, from which 
Socrates drank the poison handed him, you 
remember, by the executioner, with t^ars in 
his eyes : then the great moralist exclaimed, 
there is but one God, and drew off the fatal 
draught. This, too, is a singular little thing; 
likewise a piece of pottery shaped like a can- 
dlestick, with a bilge in the middle, and a 
hole in the top. The Greeks called it lach- 
rymatory, which signifies a vessel for tears. 
What idea those people had of bottling tears, 
we know not, but it reminds me of the beau- 
tiful passage of David, "Thou tellest my 
wanderings ; put Thou my tears into Thy 
bottle ; are they not in Thy book ?" These 
little tear-bottles are found in the sarcophagi, 
or the stone coffins, dug so frequently from the 
ruins of ancient Athens ; placed there by the 
friends of the deceased, and probably con- 
tained the tears of the mourners, or those 
whose profession it is in oriental countries to 
weep for the dead. 

Miss Wright was present on one of those 
occasions, and such control over the lachry- 
mal glands she never before saw : from per- 



THE PARTHENON. 



167 



feet indifFerence, they were the next moment 
seemingly lost in the deepest grief: their 
cheeks bathed in what ive call crocodile tears. 

Here is one of the little sylvan gods of the 
ancient Greeks, of pottery mould. It was 
probably a votive offering to Pan and Apollo, 
suspended perhaps in their caves, which are 
now to be seen in the side of the Athenian 
Acropohs, which literally means the highest 
point of the city. . Here is another more an- 
cient still. It must have been used in the 
days of Cadmus, from its resemblance to the 
Egyptian mummies. It is a fantastic little 
thing, marked with hieroglyphics, with arms 
folded across its breast, and robed like a 
mummy. 

Now open your hands wide, Mary, do not 
let it drop ; this is the head of a great lion, 
taken from the eaves of the Parthenon, the 
most beautiful temple ever dedicated to the 
goddess Minerva ; and it is still the model of 
architects all over the world. Put your 
hand in his mouth, here, you see it is wide 
open where the water spouted out. It was 
chiselled from a block of Pentelican marble, 



168 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY 



which in the quarry they say is pure white, 
and glistens in the sun hke rock sugar. 

Now I will give you a little marble book. 
It came from Mars Hill, where Paul stood and 
declared to the Athenians the unknown God, 
and defended himself before the Court Areo- 
pagus, and answered in the presence of the 
Athenian judges, for his bold innovation upon 
their religious faith. Four hundred years be- 
fore Christ, Socrates was tried and condemned 
upon the same spot and for the same cause. 
And a few years since, Dr. King, our mis- 
sionary in Greece, was tried for a like offence, 
which, you see, makes him the third in an 
illustrious line of criminals. When Dr. King 
went to Athens, he built his house upon a 
pile of the old ruins, from which he dug this 
water-jar. It is an ancient thing, but at the 
present time Greek maidens use them, only 
larger, for carrying water from the fountains. 
They have double handles, and when they are 
filled they hold them in their hands, one on 
each shoulder, which to us would be a weari- 
some task ; but their supple joints do not mind 
it, and if we too had some such exercise, our 



CHIBOUC AND NIGAELE. 16d 

forms would perhaps be more erect, and our 
chests more expansive. 

This httle stone is a bit of mosaic, taken 
from the floor of the old temple dedicated to 
Ceres, at Eleusis, twelve miles from Athens. 
Anciently this temple was visited by the 
Athenians annually, in great processions, to 
pay their adoration to the goddess Ceres ; the 
road to it was called the " sacred way." 

Now, Mary, we come to a shelf full of 
Turkish things, from Smyrna, Asia Minor. 
Some large dolls, representing the Turks and 
Armenians in their different costumes ; the 
chibouc or long pipe ; and the nigaele, which is 
a glass vase beautifully painted. When used, 
it is filled with water ; and it has a httle fire- 
place in the top, where the tobacco is burned, 
and from which the smoke comes down into 
the water, keeping it constantly bubbling, and 
then passes off through a long elastic tube, the 
end of which the smoker has in his moath, 
and may sit across the room if he like. This 
and coffee-sipping, you know, are the Turks= 
greatest luxuries. By the way, here are some 
of their cups and saucers, not saucers, but 



170 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



zarfs, little metal stands for the cups, gold oi 
silver, as they can afford. This cup holdjs 
about as much as an American would drink 
at one swallow, but a Turk would be an hour 
sipping it and blowing it into the smoke of his 
pipe. Not long since, a traveller from our 
country called at the house of a Pacha in 
Smyrna ; when helped to this mark of hospi- 
tality, instead of holding it gracefully between 
his thumb and finger, and sipping it gently, he 
seized it with his whole hand, and drank it off 
at once, much to the annoyance of the good 
Pacha, who of course thought his guest greatly 
wanting in etiquette, and asked his attendants, 
" Who is this barbarian ?" " Let us do what 
we are going to do quickly, and be off," is 
every where the characteristic motto of the 
American. 

Dear Mary, you will be weary if I take time 
to tell you of all these curiosities, and their 
many associations. But these little Turkish 
amulets are so very curious. They are made 
of glass, like small bells, and are worn upon 
the donkeys and camels, to keep off the " evil 
eye," as they say, or the influence of jealousy 



PHYLACTERIES. 171 

and envy. The children wear them also, foi 
the same purpose. A little daughter of one 
of our missionaries, who, of course, woie 
no such badge of oriental superstition, was 
visited by some of the natives ; who, after 
lavishhig upon the fair one their extravagant 
praises of her beauty, spit in her face, to pre- 
vent her being flattered, which was doubtless 
a very efiectual preventive to her vanity. 

Matthew says of the Pharisees, " they do all 
their works to be seen of men, and make 
broad their phylacteries." Well, here is a 
phylactery too, and a great many other Roman 
relics, among which is a box of choice needle- 
work of gold and silver embroidery, which we 
could appreciate better if we could see. Be- 
side, Mary, we would like to take a peep into 
this ca^e of minerals, which extends across the 
entire room. Like every thing else, this cabi- 
net had its beginning. Twelve years ago ^ 
gentleman presented the Preceptress a few 
stones picked from a quarry in this neighbor- 
hood, which have been gradually accumulat- 
ing, until now this room is a casket of curiosi- 
ties. About that time, tlie school was founded 



172 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



by Miss Marietta and Miss Emily Ingham 
from Massachusetts — and ever since they 
have been gradually enlarging and improving 
their building and increasing i*s advantages, 
until at present there are few schools in the 
United States which afford greater facilities 
for the education of young ladies. Its libraries 
are large and select, and the conservatory is 
of itself a little world of beauty and thought. 
Professor Stanton, Avho is at the head of the 
school, is a well-known Artist. His gallery 
and studio are hung with choice paintings, 
both by the old Masters, and the work of his 
own hand. A teacher of painting here, is a 
lady who has been always deaf They say 
when she is kneeling at the easel, her whole 
soul seems inspired with the beauty of her 
art, and the forms she leaves upon canvas 
appear to kindle at the glances of her eye. 

Mary, I do sometimes really doubt whether 
or not, when jproperly considered, it is a mis- 
fortune to be blind. Is not our whole nature 
improved, and our immortal being elevated 
through this privation ? Our sense of feeling 
becomes so delicate, and such a source of 



MISFORTUNE COMrENSATED. 173 

instruction and new pleasure. Only think of 
Miss Cynthia, she can feel distinctly the lines 
and spaces of ordinary printed music. And 
our hearing is so quickened, and our imagina- 
tilon so fleet, and memory too^ what new power 
she possesses, and how tenaciously she clings 
to every thing, often astonishing even to our- 
selves. And beside, we know that our feel- 
ings are more sensitive, and our attachments 
stronger and more lasting ; and there are few 
fields of intellectual research in which we 
may not enter and compete successfully with 
those who see* # * » * 



Rochester^ April 11, 1848. 

My good friend Mr. D. : — Your long 
looked for, and thankfully received letter 
rias till now remained unanswered, but not 
because I have been unmindful of its kindly 
•contents, I was indeed both sorry and sur^ 
prised to learn that you have resigned your 



174 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



Station as one of the managers of the , 

knowing as I do your former devotion to its 
best interests. But my acquaintance with 

youj Mr. D , assures me that you took not 

such a step, without good reasons for so 
doing. 

The success of benevolence and rehgion, is 
not wholly dependent upon the efforts of man. 
God tan work and none can hinder, and in 
due time the labor of his hands shall be 

accomplished. But, Mr. D , when I think 

of being again barred within those massive 
walls, my heart sinks at the thought of your 
coming there no more, to heighten with your 
presence our pensive joys. Oh ! I fondly 
hope you will visit us sometimes, and let us 
feel the pressure of your friendly hands, and 
the cordial greeting of your endearing words. 
I have passed the winter with my Rochester 
friends. Spring has come, and it is decided 
that I take the cars on the first May morning, 
for the New- York Institution. 

A shadow of sadness nestles in my heart 
when I picture the future ; but we see not as 
God sees. It is a part of my faith that what- 



RESIGNATION. 173 

ever is, is for the best, so I manage to put on 
as sunny a face as possible, and laugh when 
tliey speak of my returning, and resuming my 
labors as a noviciate. We have had a charm- 
ing winter, and the last twelve days have 
been exceedingly fine. Lizzy and Carry are 
busy bossing their gardeners, so I have had 
an opportunity of passing much of my time 
out of doors. My general health is very 
good, but alas for these poor eyes ! I much 
fear they will never recover from the severe 
blows and coal fires of the Institution. 

Glad 10 hear that Mrs. B. and her family 
are w<j11. I shall write her soon. Please 
share my heart's most affectionate regards with 
Mrs. D. and the other members of your family, 
and believe me ever gratefully yours. 



Loiig Island Water-Cure, Aug. 31, 184S. 

My most excellent friend Mr. D. : — 
You may think me unmindful of the many 
demands upon your time. Mrs. N. replied, 
after reading your last, that she would be most 



176 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



happy to be the bearer of a note to you, an op- 
portunity which I cannot let pass. Dr. N. is 
certainly one of the choicest spirits I evei 
knew. He greets me every day with " how 
do you do, my child ?" so affectionately, that I 
am getting to love him with my whole heart. 
Mrs. N. is very like him. Fanny Forester and 
and several other lights of the age, were pupils 
of hers. Mr. D., I am certainly very happy 
here, and perfectly satisfied with every thing 
as it is. I wrote you the other day by Mr. E., 
did you get it ? All is going on now as then, 
only the vrater is growing colder, and I am 
every day stronger and can walk farther. 
With as much grateful affection as my heart 
can give, I send you this brief note. I cannot 
tell you how very, very glad I am to hear from 
you. Your missives, as you call them, are 
precious things ; all here love to read them ; 
indeed we are so out of reading matter, that 
old letters are sometimes resorted to for pas- 
time. The other day Mrs. N. read me all cf 
yours, often exclaiming as she read on, " What 
a blessed man that Mr. D. is ; I certainly must 
itnow him." 



THE SWEET ASSURANCE. 177 

Oh, every body is so kind to me ! Thank 
you for tliat sweet assurance, that this dark- 
ness does not cloud the hearts of my friends, 
that it does not make them love me less ; their 
love and sympathy are all that bind me to 
earth. They are God's gifts, and I do prize 
them. They spring up every where now, but 
will it be always so? God grant it may! 
Heaven bless you, and all yours ' 



Cousin Will : — I am glad you have at last 
begun to paste your scraps. I have written, 
according to your request, the following little 
address, which if you please you may copy 
neatly, and place upon the first page ; and 
when your book is completed, I will write for 
you the close. The accompanying engravings 
are some which I selected for my own use, but 
1 do not care for them now. You must border 
them Avith gilt, and intersperse them through 
your book ; they will both relieve and orna- 
ment its pages. 
8# 



178 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



TO MY SCRAP-BOOK. 



I found thee amidst a multitude — a nameless, blank, un* 
meaning thing ; with a look expressing nought but cold 
neglect. Perchance it was pity moved me ', or the kind 
feeling of the good Samaritan. Be that as it may, I passed 
thee not by, but have brought thee to my own home ; and 
iienceforth we will be friends, dwelling together in unity 
and love. Thou shalt be to me a silent companion, sharing 
all my joys and sorrows ; and I will gather for thee from 
the storehouse of knowledge ; I will enrich thee with the 
unfading beauties of thought — with treasures of intelle-ct ; 
and the holy fires of feeling and love, hope and ambition, 
too, shall be thine. Upon thy heart will be written indehbly 
the laws of gratitude and the great rule of right ; and 
thou wilt speak a language pure as lisped by angel-tongues. 
Thy lessons of wisdom I will make the mottoes of my 
life. I will bind them about my heart, and be governed 
by them in all my ways. Thou wilt reason, too, and re- 
flect ; and oft, as we onward journey, when Silence holds 
her spell-hke reign, thou wilt turn my free thoughts back- 
ward, far o'er the current of years, gathering for me all 
Ufe's scattered sweets into one hour. 

The Poet's art shall be thine ; and, more eloquent than 
lyre of purest note, thou shalt sing of Him who sits in ma- 
jesty enthroned, whose hand has gemmed the upper skies, 
and given the rose its tint. For my sadder hours, thou 



THE PROMISE. 179 

" Wilt weave a melancholy song ; 
And sweet the strain shall be, and long — 
The melodies of death." 

This is a changing world. Those whom we learn to 
love, die ; and thou wilt chronicle for me their departure, 
and keep in memory their virtues. Earth has many sor- 
rows ; and when the dews of feeling gather on my heart, 
and glisten in my eye, thy treasured words, in kindness 
spoken, shall be music in my ears ; and when years are 
multiplied, and my hand has forgotten to act, and my heart 
ceased to feel, thou shalt have a place in my library with 
the ' world's illustrious," companioned with the mighty 
minds of old, whose names with thee shall be familiar as 
household words. 

Too often the promises of men, like music, when passed, 
are obsolete ; and we know that " passing away I" is the 
language of earth ; besides, we are not the keepers of our- 
selves, nor the rulers of our own ways. But what I have 
promised, that will I do ; and after many days, thou shalt 
bear witness that, Hke the faithful Samuel of old, " I kept 



MY WORD. 



5^ * ^J: * * 



P. S. Cousin Will, this is St. Valentine's 
day. I wish I could write you something that 
wou.d so strike the chord of cherished memo- 
ries, as to make your heart vibrate for ever to 
their pleasant melodies. 

My little pet Nickie is recovering : so for a 



180 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



time heaven will have one angel less, but Mrs. 

B 's circle has one more, and may it be long 

ere it is broken. 



New-York Institution for the Blind, June 16, 1849. 

The Chief of the Ojibeway tribe, during 
his recent stay in New- York, gave us a call. 
His very tread is majesty, and, while being 
escorted through the house, he stopped to 
shake hands with every one, and spoke so 
tenderly to the little boys and girls, that they 
weie moved even to tears. He told those 
who held their heads down, that if the 
Indians had them they would lash them to 
boards to make them grow straight. When 
all were assembled in the Chapel, Mr. Cham- 
berlain introduced him. Then Miss Cynthia 
arose, and in her own sweet voice, welcomed 
him as follows :— 

Oh, welcome, thou stranger, our hearts' warm emotions 
Are clustering round thee, thou Chief of the brave ; 
We dream of the hour when with holy devotion. 
Thy people first welcomed our sires from tho wave. 

* « « « » to 



OJIBEWAY CHIEF. 18) 

We love thy harangues, thy war-song and Btory 
Thy pine-wooded forests, so leafless and drear, 
The red child of Nature, that bursts forth in glory. 
To chase from its covert the fleet-footed deer. 

But mostly, we cherish the heart where the spirit 
ITath planted its impress, all deathless and bright. 
For the children of promise by birthright inherit 
The fountain of knowledge that gloweth with light. 

But, sire, thou vnlt leave us ; when absent, remember 
The hearts who have welcomed thy coming to-day. 
And fondly will pray for the fate of thy people. 
Whose children, like spring-time, are passing away. 

To which the great Chief rephed so beauti- 
fully and so affectingly that I can give you 
no conception of his words. He speaks Eng- 
lish imperfectly, but his figures and illustra- 
tions are so fine — nearly every sentence had 
in it some picture from Nature, gathered by 
her own child. The master spirits of olden 
time, the thunders of whose eloquence shook 
the Grecian forum and awed the world, were 
from the forest ; and like them the chief of the 
Ojibeways studied beneath the broad canopy 
of the sky, by the light of the myriad stars, 
and gathered his imagery amid the cloud- 



182 A PLACE IN THV MEMORY. 

capped hills of the West, where the red man 
in his native pride follows the buffalo m 
chase, and where Missouri's waters in prism 
beauties dash, steers his bark canoe. 

Speaking of his brethren of the forest, he 
said : " Nature has given the Indian a great 
and good heart, and if you would know what 
religion and learning would do for him, hold 
a diamond in the sunbeams and watch its 
sparkling. True, my people see the glories of 
yonder sun, and dance with delight when he 
comes up from the waves ; but a far brighter 
light shines in upon your minds. You have 
learned of God and the Bible, and I hope 
when the shades of night have fallen on the 
world, and you go to rest, and the angels are 
leaning over you listening to your whispeied 
prayers, you will not forget the children of the 
forest And when the morning breaks may 
blessings fall upon them like showers of rain 
drops upon withered flowers." 

A fly might as well try to take the altitude 
of a mountain, as for me to attempt to give 
you an idea of his eloquence. His object in 
passing through the country is to excite, if 



HIS PETITION. 183 

possible, an interest in behalf of his wronged 
and oppressed people. At the next session of 
Congress he purposes petitioning Government 
for a tract of land in the Northwest Territo- 
ries, which shall be to the Indian an inherit- 
ance for ever, to be neither bought nor sold 
by any nation. Then, with proper efforts, he 
thinks civilization, agriculture, the arts and 
sciences, religion and refinement, may be in- 
troduced among them with comparative ease. 
In the course of his remarks he exclaimed : 
" Upon whose grounds do your proud institu- 
tions rest? Where dug you the stones of 
which they are piled, and from whose forests 
were their timbers hewed ? Who welcomed 
your fathers from the sea, and whose wig- 
wams hid them from the storm, their enemies, 
and beasts of the wood ? Who smoked with 
them the pipe of peace, and showed them 
lakes and streams running like silver currents 
upon the bosom of the earth, and when 
their French foes came down from the 
north with battle-axe and spear, v/ho, like 
the Chief of the Mohawks, harangued 
his braves, and bared his own breast, and 



184 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

nobly fell in their defence ? But oh ! we 
will speaK no more of this. Too many of our 
sires sleep side by side in their angry blood 
where they fell. The Indian has done evil, 
but he has sometimes done good ; and how 
much he has been wronged, the Great Spirit 
and his angels only know. When I look over 
these grain fields, so far as the eye can reach, 
my aching heart asks. What has my people 
received in return ? What have the pale faces 
given in exchange for all these garden scenes ? 
They have taught our lips to thirst for fire- 
water instead of our mountain springs, and 
our bows and arrows we have laid down for 
the white man's thunder-sticks, and no more 
can we chase the fleet-footed deer, or follow 
the fox to his hole, or the wolf to his cave ; 
for we are weary and our spirits do fail, and 
our hearts grow sick and die within us." 

The Indian is not all of savage mould ; the 
highly significant names he left' upon our 
lakes and rivers is sufiicient index to his per- 
ceptions of the beautiful. Who, speaking a 
language that expresses every shade of thought^ 
sould have conceived a more fit appellation 



OBERON. 185 

foi the placid waters of a lake than Winnipi- 
seogee, which means a smile of the Great 
Spirit? By the light of his own unassisted 
reason, the Indian has come to know and feel 
that there is a God, whom he ignorantly but 
reverently worships ; he marks his fierce wrath 
in the whirlwind, and hears his anger in the 
thunder's roar ; he sees his displeasure in the 
waning of the moon, and feels his love in the 
warmer light of the sun. 



Institution for the Blind, 1849. 

My noble friend Marion : — It is Satur* 
day, teacher's holiday, and Sibyl is, as usual, 
with her mother. Mr. Stevens, from the Theo- 
logical Seminary, called this afternoon to favor 
. s with some reading sent us by Dr. Turner, 
and the last two hours Miss Cynthia and I 
have listened in raptures to the beautiful poem 
" Oberon," a translation from the German of 
Wieland ; and when we came to where Huoe 
and Rizia had crossed the fearful mountain, 
and landed safe in the hermit's vale, I engaged 
my friend's hand wherewith to write you. 



186 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

Marion, I have no claims upon either youi 
sympathy or regard. If there is any lovehness 
m my nature, I am sure my actions never re- 
vealed it to you, for dependence has always 
made me act the part I would not act. In my 
seeing days, I was proud and resolute, like 
yourself ; no barriers were too high for me to 
surmount, no difficulties too hard to remove. 
Once convinced where the path of duty lay, 
thither my spirit perseveringly trod ; but now 
darkness has made my soul a cellar plant, and 
its most enduring energies are marked with 
weakness. 

I often pause and wonder for what Provi- 
dence is preparing me ; what order of spirit 
must I be, that this course of discipline is 
needful? Whither would my footsteps have 
led me, if darkness had not set them to wan- 
dering ? The way I once pursued to happi- 
ness is hedged up ; but God has mercifully 
opened another, and though it is a mountain 
way, and often rough and barren, yet some 
little fountains of joy do well up along my 
path, and always too, where I least expect 
them. 



GOOD SAMARITANS. 



187 



I have recently set my hand to a Uttle work^ 
and, dear Marion, am I presuming too much 
upon your disinterestedness, when I ask you 
to aid me? The influence of the good is al- 
ways desirable, but especially so in an under- 
taking where success is in the least doubtful. 
You number in your list many- friends, and 
hoping you will be pleased to gather among 
them a few subscribers for the volume I am 
about to pubhsh, I send you the accompanying 
prospectus. If in your heart it meet with a 
cordial reception, some names must grace its 
pages. I am to remain here until my book is 
published. Many of the good and great are 
aiding me, and they say I am bound to succeed. 

My regards to Mrs. L , and my love to 

Lizzie, who first walked with me to church 
after I <JOuld not see, and Mary, who led me 
first among the flowers, and I called her Teary, 
because she wept with me. And Carrie, who 
sold her pretty veil to buy for me some shoes ; 
I shall never forget my baker friend, who sent 
me the gold, nor Franky dear, who returned 
her watch to the jeweller's, to place some mo- 
ney in my purse. 



188 



A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 



I love to remember those good souls, Mrs. 
Sparks and Miss Crane, who watched by m«^ 
so many long and painful nights. Though I 
never see them more, and get tidings frons 
them only at long intervals ; still, like the 
Pyramids of Egypt, I know they are there, 
and unchanged. 

There are less true friends in the world for 
want of a proper knowledge of what consti- 
tutes real friendship, than for any defect in 
purpose. A true friend, is one who would 
defend you^ when he would allow himself to 
be wronged ; is incensed at an outrage upon 
your character or rights, when if it were him- 
self, he would hardly heed it ; and while he 
regrets your errors frankly admonishes you, 
and then bears with your weaknesses as if 
they were his own. Some persons make 
friends with you to-day, but to-morrow with 
the slightest pretext withdraw their favor. 
Perchance you have uttered a sentiment, oi 
taken a liberty that does not accord precisely 
with their views ; or some others have ex- 
pressed opinions derogatory to your worth, and 



TRUE TO THE END. 189 

behold they are gone. And yet there is Uttle 
room to censure them, for love is not always 
perennial ; and when the sun has ceased to 
shine warmly upon it, nothing is more natural 
than that it should die, as the leaves wither 
and fall when the storms of winter pelt upon 
the trees. 

But, dear Marion, when I look into my own 
heart, and see how imperfectly I have ever filled 
the offices of a true friend to any one, I feel 
whatever I may say upon the subject is but a 
tirade against myself Indeed nothing short of 
an elevated nature, and a redeemed heart, 
can make us perfectly disinterested in any 
relation. 

Modern philosophy and religion teach that 
the world is rapidly growing better ; if so, the 
time will come when it may be said of all 
wno profess to be friends, like Saul and Jon- 
athan, "In their lives they were lovely and 
pleasant, and in their death they were not 
divided." 

• *»♦»#*# 

Raphael never wrote any unwelcome news 



190 A PLACE IN THY MEMORY. 

to those he loved, nor did he leave au ugly 
picture on canvas ; he said there is a bright 
and dark side to human life, and when the 
light has left us, it is better to bring it back by 
imagination, than mourn over its absence. 

For a farthing one can buy a song, and 
tliere is no good thing in this world that 
money will not purchase, save a heart that 
always beats in unison with one's own : 
and is right out with every thing, iau'lts 

and all. With such souls, as Mrs. G 

says, we do not converse, but talk, lay aside 
all ceremony, cast off restraint, and word 
our thoughts as they occur, and our feelings 
just as they spring, spontaneous from the 
soul; but such spirits we seldom meet, for 
like all that is good in this life, they linger by 
the way, and we iiave little cause for surprise 
when they leave us early. In writing, we 
only hit at things, instead of expressing them 
freely ; this morning I would love to transmit 
to you a true copy of my troubled feelings, for 
I know that you would sustain me by youi 



GOOD-t^. W\ 

assurances, and I should be profited by you> 
counsels. 

Good-by, Marion, that our heavenly Father 
may bless you, and keep you always in his 
love, is the prayer of your friend, — 

S. H. De K 



TyR SK3) 



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